Refinish an egg with a feather or two...

Pale green and white speckled eggs with feathers glued to their surfaces.

        These factory-made speckled eggs were refreshed with just a small swipe or two of Mod Podge and speckled brown feathers. They took only moments to reinvent! Try doing the same in a variety of colored feathers and eggs. 
       Once I paint the basket shown below, I will include an updated version of it for visitors to see at a later date. For now it is white and will trim an egg tree along with other soft green and white eggs and things...

An egg is nestled inside of a cotton batting, bent 'ivy' basket. This is what the basket looks like
before it is painted to look like ivy. Some people prefer to keep their cotton baskets unpainted.
 If I were to hang this basket on a Christmas tree, I would dust it with glitter
  and twist on a few berries.

• How to Make A Faux, Twisted Ivy Basket?

Craft Cardboard "Resurrection" Eggs . . .

Cardboard 'Resurrection' eggs displayed on thorny shrubs.

        These cardboard eggs are both simpler and more economical for young children to assemble than the version I have described at my Easter blog. I have also included a variety of butterflies and a moth below that young students may print out on their home computers.
       To make cardboard eggs like these you will need the following supplies: cardboard, an egg pattern, decorative scrap papers, white school glue, small twigs collected from outdoors, green acrylic paints, a few cotton balls, string for hanging, a chenille stem and butterfly/moth clip art.

Left, shaping pupa with cotton on a chenille stem. Right, the chrysalis/pupa still need green paint.

Step-by-Step Instructions:

1. Cut out the egg shape from scrap cardboard.
2. Cover both the front and back of this egg with scrapbook papers. Some children may wish to choose to cover their backgrounds with a sky blue paper or a photo of the sky with clouds from a magazine. Other children may choose to interpret their "resurrection'' eggs with more artistic license and select any kind of decorative paper for this vignette. Either choice is fine as long as parents or teachers teach the symbolic meaning associated with the transformation story. I've included links to these below.
3. Cut out a butterfly or moth to paste onto the egg. Alternatively, teachers could purchase butterfly stickers for the craft in advance to stick onto the egg.
4. Now puddle the glue and adhere a small twig to the egg. Let dry.
   
5. Cut a one inch segment of the chenille stem. Bend one end piece of this stem slightly.
6. Unravel the cotton ball, only one of these per student will be necessary if that much.
7. Squeeze a tiny bit of glue along the bristly edge of the cut stem and wrap the stem with the cotton batting. Repeat this step until the stem is shaped to look like a chrysalis, the pupa of a butterfly or moth. If you feel this method is a bit too fussy for very young children: you could shape this pupa from air dry clay or find a photo of the butterfly chrysalis to print and paste onto the egg.
8. Puddle the glue a bit to get the pupa/chrysalis to stick to the cardboard surface.
   
9. Brush on Mod Podge coating last to preserve the egg surface, twig and chrysalis.
10. Punch a hole into the egg, to string a twine or ribbon through it so that little ones may hang the egg in a display or on an egg tree.
    
    

    

    See the cotton batting chrysalis up close.
    

    
    

    

    More versions of Resurrection eggs with the butterfly symbol.
    

     

What do caterpillars, butterflies, eggs and pupa have to do with the Resurrection?

• The story behind the butterfly often told in Christian churches, families and communities... and the second half of the story here. 
  

 Butterflies and Moth Clip Art: resize these as needed...

• Vintage Butterfly Clip Art - most of these are yellow

 

Decoupage Wild Birds On Eggs

"God created the great sea monsters and every living creature that moves,
with which the waters swarmed after their kind, and every
winged bird after its kind;..." Genesis 1:21

       The birds shown in the photo above were decoupaged onto flat, egg-shaped, cardboard cut-outs using magazine pages and a bird book cover from a child's ornithology text book. To make some eggs similar to our own you may download printable birds from the samples restored under my Paper Doll Workshop page.
       "The common name for a bird in the Hebrew Scriptures, is tzephur, the rapid mover, or harrier; a name very expressive of these volatile creatures. A more general and indefinite name is ouph, a flier; but this appellation denotes every thing that flies whether bird or insect. It is frequently translated "fowl" in the English Bible. A bird of prey is called oith, a rusher, from the impetuosity with which is rushes upon its prey. In several of the passages where it occurs, our translators have rendered its plural form by "fowls."

• Find printable cardinals and tanajers here.
• Find printable finches here.

'Nesting Chicken' Easter Egg

Little hen nesting in an Easter egg.

       Turn a half egg into a grass-lined nest for a hen. This makes a clever little ornament to hang on an egg tree at Easter or if you prefer, on a Christmas tree.

• See more animals made for a Vintage Easter Display...
  
• DIY Broody Hens with pom-poms here. - alternative chicken body types instead of the cotton batting one shown on this post.
• and The simplest pom-pom hens for your youngest students here - at our doll blog
  

Supplies Needed:

• A plastic egg, just lower half
  
• 3 cotton balls
• white school glue
• masking tape
• one chenille stem
• a few goose down feathers or white feathers
• watercolors
• dried grass to line the 'egg' nest
• decorative paper and trim for the egg

Step-by-Step Instructions:

1. Open the plastic egg and keep only the lower half for this particular craft. 
2. Cover the entire part of the egg with masking tape, neatly smoothing out wrinkles with your thumbnail as you go.
3. Decoupage decorative paper on the outside of the egg. Let dry.
4. Attach a handle to the inside of the egg using masking tape.
   
5. Puddle the glue on the inside and line the egg with craft grass of some kind.
6. To shape the hen, cut from a wire two inches and bend the tip into a 'hook' shape as seen in the photo below. 
7. Wrap the wire with a fine layer of glue and twist the cotton batting onto it in layers to shape a hen's beak, head, neck and body.
8. It is not necessary to add or shape the legs of the hen as she is in the seated position, tucked into the dried grassy nest. Puddle the glue generously and tuck her down into the nest.
9. Let her dry in place before adding down feather where her wings and tail should be. 
10. Shape the comb and paint this with red watercolor. Glue it on.
11. Paint the beak yellow and then the eyes.
12. Shape a fancy hook from the left over wire.
    

How to shape the head and neck of the hen from wire and cotton.

Steps for assembling the egg basket and pasting in the parts.

A soft, small hen nestled inside the lower half of a decoupaged Easter egg makes nice addition to egg tree.

"Which came first, the chicken
 or the egg," sung by Mike Stewart

How to make maritime scrap collage eggs . . .

Decoupage flat eggs with Maritime themes for the Easter egg tree.

       Cardboard egg cut-outs with sea or ocean themed subjects. I used the following items to embellish these scrapbook egg ornaments: blue ribbon, tiny real shells, nautical stamps, reprints of Victorian die cuts and Mod Podge. Below are a few of my own printables that students may use to craft their own versions, if the like.

• Victorian print of children playing on the beach here. - This print would also look nice on an egg too.
• Visit the out Beacon Chapel, a safe internet 'harbor' and space to weather the storms of life...
• Read about the significance of light houses as Christian symbolism
•  The symbolic connections between the escallop sea shell and Christianity
• Why Christians use anchor symbolism
  

 Step-by-Step Instructions:

1. Cut out cardboard shaped eggs.
2. Glue on decorative papers to both sides. 
3. String blue ribbon through a hole inside a real shell and then through the top of each egg.
4. Apply a generous amount of white glue to the shell hanger to prevent it from working loose from the hole.
5. Brush on Mod Podge to add stamps, die cuts and any other interesting pictures or text to the maritime egg creations.
   

Antique shell paper

Etching of ships

Sailor boy die cut

The 'Unbreakable' Easter Eggs

Two plastic egg versions decoupaged with yellow
and green tissues and trimmed with ribbons.

       The 'unbreakable' egg in this instance will not be totally lost if it falls from the branches of an egg tree; it will, however, break if you run over it with a truck. So, I guess it is still breakable but just not in all instances like the common egg! And as always, the abilities of the crafter are more apparent within the aesthetics of the resulting egg. For some this process is heavenly, for others it will look like a 'hot mess.' Just keep practicing...

• To see how to decoupage a pattern or scene from a napkin onto an Easter egg.
  

Supplies Needed: 

• plastic eggs
• masking tape
• tissue papers
• decorative trims
• tacky craft glue
• Mod Podge
• ribbon, twine or wire for hanging

Left, see tiny holes at the top and bottom of the eggs; you can thread a ribbon or twine
through these holes to hang the eggs from an egg tree. Right, large plastic eggs used
for decoupage from our local Dollar Store.

 Step-by-Step Instructions:

1. First insert the hanger for your eggs through the wholes provided at one of the ends of the egg. You can hide the knot if you like on the inside of the egg so that it will not be seen. Then pull the hanger up through the outside of the egg.
2. Snap together the two halves of your plastic egg and use masking tape to keep the seam closed.
3. Cover the entire surface of the plastic egg now with masking tape. Use the tip of your finger nails to smooth out wrinkles and creases made by the tape.
4. Using small amounts of white school glue or Mod Podge, apply the tissue wherever you find it pleasing. Do cover the entire surface with the tissue. This process takes time because you must wait for areas of the egg to dry before moving on to other areas to cover. 
5. Once all of the egg is decoupaged, glue on the fancier trims if there are any.
6. Mod Podge the entire finished tissue surfaces of the Easter egg left exposed.
7. Hand your creation from anywhere on an egg tree. If it falls off the branches, this particular kind of egg will not break as will an actual egg.
   

Strawberry Easter Eggs

Strawberry eggs displayed with grass and pedestals.

      The gradient on these eggs is produced by leaving the lower sections of the egg in the red dye for longer periods of time, gradually removing the dye so that the upper-most sections are pinker to white. To make a perfect strawberry egg one must use a bit of timing and have a handy eye-dropper or nasal aspirator to help the process along the way... The more gradual the color change is from one end to the other is what folks predetermine to be superior dye job. However, I'm not such a stickler about Easter eggs. I like them all really and have enjoyed eating them perfect or not!

 

Left, hard boiling white eggs. Center, gradually remove dye with aspirator. Right, polished with
cooking oil and ready to eat.

How To Make Perfect Strawberry Easter Eggs:

1. Hard boil a set of white eggs prior to the dying process. Let them cool but do not remove the shells.
2. Make the egg dye with red food coloring only. Boil in the kettle approximately one and a half cups of water. You will need only as much water as is necessary to cover one egg entirely after it is  submerged in the dye bath. 
3. Pour approximately one cup of the boiling water into a heat proof mug or dish.
4. Add one Tablespoon of white vinegar to the water in the mug.
5. Add 5 to 6 drops of red food dye into the water and stir. It is important that you make this dye very bright red. Have a second empty mug next to the one filled with dye so that you can save the dye removed for another strawberry egg.
6. Now submerge the white egg into the red dye with the narrow end pointing up.
7. Using an eye-dropper or aspirator to suck up just enough of the dye to reveal the tip of the egg after only a few seconds. This will be the whitest or palest part of the strawberry egg once the dying process is finished. Discard the extra dye into a spare container and repeat the removal of dye in the same way every few minutes. The egg will eventually be turned right-side up once the dying is done.
   
8. Let the eggs air dry on a dish towel.
9. Draw the tiny black seeds on the eggs using a black permanent ink pen.
10. To add the caps, Mod Podge small green leaves to the wider top end of the strawberries if you prefer. I don't usually add the caps. I nestle these strawberry eggs inside of green cupcake liners at each brunch plate.
11. Rub on a very light coating of cooking oil, using a paper napkin, to give the eggs a slight shine.
12. Refrigerate till the next morning, Easter Sunday.
13. Decorate an Easter brunch table with these eggs, crack to open and peal shell off.
14. Crumble the hard boiled egg, sprinkle with salt and pepper and eat promptly with hash browns and sausage!

More Strawberry Themed Crafts for Fans of the Fruit:

• How to make cotton batting strawberries for a feather tree or a larger Christmas tree indoors.
• Folk paint a charming jewelry box with strawberries for dollhouse play.
  

Puzzle Eggs and Game Extension Ideas

 Make learning fun for your kids this Easter with this inexpensive handmade gift for Easter baskets.

      Here is a new twist on an old idea, craft egg puzzles for children ages three through seven, using multiple decorative papers and eggs shapes cut from heavy poster board. You will also need white school glue and a sharp pair of scissors. 

      Start teaching with just one egg puzzle then gradually add more eggs to children's egg puzzle collection with different patterns. 

       Store all of the egg puzzle pieces together. Then children will need to separate related patterns and colors from that group before beginning to assemble each egg. Both the sorting activities and the fitting of pieces together are excellent practice for early readers!

• What children know and need to learn about patterns and algebraic thinking. - from Stanford University, and learning these must begin early folks!
• Read about The Power of Color from Montessori.org
• Fun and Easy Tips for Setting Up A Preschool Puzzle Center! - excellent advice from PreK Pages! Not all children think the same way about puzzles. I began teaching puzzles to my students at three years of age. They grew to love this exercise! Start with very easy wooden puzzles.

See how the eggs are cut into puzzle pieces.

 

Step-by-Step Instructions for Parents/Older Siblings:

1. You can use any flat egg template to make your own versions of these egg puzzles or draw your own. Eggs don't need to be all the same size either; these may vary in size and proportion.
2. Cut out the egg pattern, trace around it on top of poster board. Repeat and cut out as many eggs as you like.
3. Brush on white school glue to one side of the poster cut outs. Press on colorful wrapping papers or decorative scrapbook papers. Use only one kind of printed wrapping paper per egg. The more distinct the papers are from each other, the better. Remember these puzzles are for children ages three to seven.
4. To increase the difficulty of putting the puzzles together you can: multiply the number of eggs, mix the pieces together in the same box/bag, make the pieces for each puzzle smaller or increase the number of puzzle pieces included for each egg. Watch your child putting the eggs together closely in order to determine what changes to make for this game in the future.
5. Decoupage a small box or sew a simple draw string bag to store the handmade egg puzzles together. Gift them for Easter in a basket if you like.
   

More Puzzle Crafts:

• Printable jigsaw puzzle templates

Bumble Bee Easter Eggs

An example of the second to largest pattern for fabric eggs.
follow the link below to download your own patterns.

        Read instructions and make an endless supply of fabric eggs in five different sizes! Above you can see my own versions of a large fabric egg and a very small one to hang on an Easter egg tree below. Both are made from honey sweet flannel fabric scraps. I also appliqued even more bumble bees cut from that same cloth to further exaggerate the bees on my eggs and tacked on lace ''wings'' as well.

 

More fun bee hive crafts for little ones...

• Craft a Faux "Straw" Skep Hive for a Doll
• DIY a Bee Hive for Your Dolls
• Make a skep hive dollhouse craft
  

Three different sides of the same bumble bee Easter egg.

The smallest egg size you can make from the 5 egg size pattern is just right for
hanging on delicate branches. Here it is balanced on the edge of a skep hive.

Sew a few vintage velvet carrots to display among your eggs...

Fresh looking Easter arrangement of eggs and carrots inside
 of a wire basket lined with a biscuit linen cover.

       Nestled among the green and white Easter eggs are a few vintage velvet carrots made from a simple free pattern, scraps of left-over textiles and olive silk tassels. Find the veggie patterns here, download and read how to make them.

More Carrot Crafts for Easter:

• Craft spring carrot napkin rings for your Easter dinner...
  

Color The Heavens on Easter Eggs!

       These heavenly looking Easter eggs are first colored while hot and then dipped in food color once they have cooled down. Go to our Easter blog for detailed instructions and more photos of our results!

• The most wonderful part of heaven, is the Son waiting there for us...

Use older crayons with intense pigment from Crayola to get the nicest results...

Learn about Ukrainian inspired Easter eggs...

       Above are just a few of our jewel-toned, intricately painted Pysanky eggs. You can visit our Easter blog to discover the history behind the delightful egg painting traditions in the country where Pysanky have always been painted, the Ukraine. Below is a famous book about Pysanky by Patricia Polacco that many children in the United States read together along with their families and churches during Easter celebrations.

• How To Make Pysanky Eggs

LeVar Burton presents "Rechenka's Eggs" all 

about Ukrainian painted eggs..