Egg dyeing

Science!
A while ago, I experimented with dyeing eggs with natural dyes. I tried it at Easter with the brown eggs we had on hand, but it's much more fun with white eggs. These are my results ...


Eggs after initial dye
I used turmeric, purple cabbage with and without vinegar, and strained puree of greens. The vinegar mix resulted in the darker blue, but as you'll see below, it isn't very durable... it rubs off quite easily.


Eggs after rubbing and wash
I thought they were quite pretty, but I decided to experiment with some double-dyeing, so back into the jars they went.


Eggs after second dyeing
These were over-dyed with purple cabbage, nothing, purple cabbage, and turmeric. I re-dyed the non-vinegar egg to see how much darker it would get and left the rubbed vinegar egg as it was for comparison. You can see from the stripe that it did get noticeably darker, but nothing like the original vinegar egg. I prefer the more permanent dye and leaving it longer to get a darker result.

My favourite is absolutely the turmeric and purple cabbage egg. I love the speckled green with yellow stripe.


Striped double-dyed egg

Photographs and artwork by Allison Gryski. © All rights reserved.

Finishing is Fun!

Fabric bunting
Today's Studio Sunday was deeply satisfying because I finished 3 things. Two of them had been in progress for awhile and one was completely new. I am especially pleased with the fabric bunting. Our living room is much more cheerful now.


Fabric bunting
I also made a bird garland out of an IKEA placemat for the Wee Lass's room. She was very excited when she saw it, exclaiming "Dida!" (her word for birds). I think it might be cuter if I hung them off of a twig instead of yarn, but this was what I had on hand. I might try some jute twine instead to see if that is nicer, while still being less fiddly than figuring out how to hang twigs securely from plaster walls.


Bird garland
And the item I made from scratch was an apron, also for the Wee Lass, out of an IKEA tea towel. We used it almost immediately as she helped make dinner (her job was helping rinse spinach and transferring it from the colander to the pot). Of course, at 16 months old, it's all still a game to her, and she was keen to then transfer the spinach back into the colander!


Wee Apron

Photographs and artwork by Allison Gryski. © All rights reserved.