paintedeastereggs.pdf

Let me just tell you from the beginning, my son, at age 7 loved the idea of painting eggs for about 4 minutes.  He painted three of them, (which I touched up) then added faces and splotches that looked like I simply rolled the egg on one of the other paper plates full of discarded but still wet paints.

Perhaps your experience will be different, but we had fun being together for those four minutes none the less!  So if you are interested in an afternoon project one of these weekends, give this one a try.

Materials List: 

• Wooden eggs
• Craft paints
• Brushes
• Pushpins
• Metallic pens
• Drop cloth
• Paper plates

Instructions:

1.  We used push pins stuck in the tip of the eggs so we had something to hold onto while we painted.  We used paper plates to squeeze a bit of paint onto and then once we were finished with a first coat, we did lay the egg on the plate to dry.  The eggs dry rather quickly as long as you do light coats. 
We did have to put at least two coats on the eggs with some additional touch-ups when the egg would stick to the plate and pull the paint off.  (No matter how simple a project sounds, this kind of stuff always happens, doesn’t it!)

Once the eggs are dry, we did try decorating them.  I described how my son painted, and I tried polka dots and stripes, but honestly, I was having a hard time making the lines straight and keeping the paint from globbing up. 

Sooooo, we painted them all back to solid colors and did a couple things with them. 

We wrote guests names on them using a metallic marker and we plan on placing them in little nests as place cards for our holiday dinner. 

We filled tall glass vases with them and then spread them around the house….lovely.  At least it’s something different than always putting them in a basket with grass.
Try adding leaves to the mix to line the bottom of the vase.  A larger almost bell jar shape would work beautifully for the leaf idea.

Have fun with this one and let me know what age child actually does stick with the project, enjoy it as they go, and can create decorations that are able to be used…..I’ve promised myself to give my little guy another chance someday….just don’t want to wait too long!

Shari

 
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Comments (3)

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written by sheebers, April 03, 2009

These are beautiful. Something I will do as my Nieces are all to old now for "coloring Easter eggs" and I will soon have my own apartment to decorate for the holidays and this will be perfect to add little holiday touches.

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written by Shari, April 08, 2009

So glad you like them! I'll bet you can do a better job than we did trying to put designs on them. If you have a few favorites once you're done, send the photos to This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it '> This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it ! We'd love to share them with everyone!

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written by Marie, April 11, 2009

I love how the eggs look in that tall glass. (I have my bathroom soaps in one like that.)
I bet you's have better luck with young'uns giving them a solid-colored egg that you already painted, and letting them draw on them with some type of marker/paintpen. My kids found brushes very frustrating when they were young because they could not control the brush like they were used to controlling a writing instrument. So, they would not stick with it long. But, when we switched to markers (some egg decorating kits have food coloring markers for use on real eggs)the results were great. I think that it is the frustration with brush control that makes kids lose their interest fast.
Another idea, is to switch to using decopage medium and holiday paper napkins to cover the eggs. First separate the napkin layers (they are usually 2-ply).
Marie

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