Alright... Even though it is still one more day until Good Friday and I know my beautiful granny would not approve of this right now, as we always dyed our Easter Eggs on Good Friday every year.
But I still felt this itch in my fingers to do something creative! Therefore I gave the natural dye Easter eggs a second chance.
I tried to do them already last year, which didn't turn out be very successful. But with a desire to rise to the challenge and I had another go.
The first challenge for me was trying to buy some eggs that were white or very pale in color!
Back in Germany, I grew up with chickens and there eggs were usually mostly white in color.
But buying eggs in Australia, I found that 99% of egg cartons contain of brown eggs, which makes them much harder to dye.
The was my first mistake I made last year, as I had trouble finding pale or white colored eggs.
This year I got lucky!
Locally 'produced' biodynamic eggs proved to be just what I was after!
Very happy with my found, I felt inspired to get all the other ingredients I needed.
So I bought half a red cabbage, one bag of brown onions & some spinach went home and explored my garden for some flowers & leaves.
Last year I tried to get the green dye out of freshly cut grass. Didn't work!
After I picked a few flowers and foliage I went back inside and got started.
I still had some left over nylon stockings from last year that I wanted to use up, some string and my bio dynamic eggs.
To get more out of the stockings, I cut them into smaller pieces.
I put the flowers & leaves face down onto the eggs and pulled a piece of stocking over each prepared egg, pulled the stocking really tied and fastened the open ends with some string.
After preparing my little 'egg-parcels' I started to the pots ready for the dying:
- I cut up all the red cabbage and put it into a cooking pot and added some water for boiling them.
- Peeled of all the onion skin and put them into a small cooking pot with some water as well.
- Put the spinach into a pot as well with some added water.
- Placed all my prepared eggs into the different pots and started to bring to water to boil.
- Let the eggs with onion skin, red cabbage & spinach boil for about 8 min.
Take the pots of the stove and let them cool down.
I decided to put the cooled down eggs and dye mixture into some tall storage canisters and let them sit overnight.
The was probably my biggest mistake I made last year, as I only let them sit for a couple of hours.
And that wasn't enough for the dye to work!
You can leave them outside or alternatively put them in the fridge.
I didn't have any room in my fridge.
Therefore they had to stay outside for the night!
Next morning, I just couldn't wait.
Straight after getting some breakfast into my boys, I got the eggs out off the dye mixture and cut the nylon stockings open.
Soooo so happy when I peeled the stockings off!!!!
Wishing you a very creative & wonderful Easter.
Verena