Natural Dyed Eggs

I've seen posts floating around bloggerville about natural dyed eggs. I bought a "kit" for dyeing eggs with onion skins at an Easter Egg showcase in Germany many moons ago, but never got around to using it . . . I thought it was finally time to try some of the techniques!

I tried four different versions with things I had on hand.

1. Yellow Onion Skins: I used the leftover skins in the bottom of the bag in the cupboard (maybe 4 onions worth?). I boiled/simmered this with 2 cups of water for 15 minutes. Add  1 Tbsp. vinegar to the brew after straining.

2. Sleepytime Tea bags (Best used by Dec 2005--don't drink the tea at my house, I guess!): 4 teabags, cup of water, microwave for 1 minute 30 seconds and allow to steep 5 minutes. Remove tea bags and feed them to the worms!

3. Red Onion Skins: Once again, I cleaned out the science experiments in the cupboard! This is probably the skins of 4 red onions boiled with 2 cups of water for 15 minutes. Add  1 Tbsp. vinegar to the concoction after straining.

4. Blueberries: Simmer 1 cup blueberries with 1 cup water. We picked these at The Blueberry Ranch in Granger this summer. I will use the leftover berries after straining for a smoothie or something.

Here are the varying colors after straining. They are ready for dyeing!

We were kind of in the middle of homework, making dinner, working on pinewood derby craziness, so we dipped eggs as we could amidst the chaos!

A spoon helped gently lower the eggs and take them out. We checked every once in a while to see the desired colors, though once dry, the eggs were slightly different, too.

We used the egg carton for drying, but flipped them over often and dried out the extra liquid at the bottom of the carton.

We tried a little crayon resist--I really like how this added a little extra decoration to the rustic colored eggs. The boys were good with scribbles! The tea is the pale yellow on the left, blueberry in the middle, yellow onion on the right and red onion on the bottom. The directions I first read described the red onion as giving the color of jade, but I'd just call it a version of brown in our results.

I would call it a success! We enjoyed the process and thought of using all natural things we had in the house. There was a bit of science experiment quality to it the boys liked. Pretty eggs! Happy Easter! I will say, while they are pretty, they look similar to the eggs my brother and sister-in-law are getting from their chickens. They have gorgeous colors, but maybe no purples! I don't think their eggs would need any dyeing--we had to get white eggs from the store for these.

Okay, geeky side of me asked INPAWS if there were any native plants that are used for dyeing Easter Eggs--the peeps on the Facebook page didn't know of any good options. Challenge, maybe??

Here are a few "inspiration" posts for naturally dyed eggs:

Vegetable Dyed Easter Eggs

Mother Earth Living: Coloring Easter Eggs

Better Homes & Gardens