This time, we made Pysanky eggs. Our goal was to have a great craft, but especially to appreciate the labor involved in this difficult task and the skills used.
First, the children pricked a small hole in both sides of the egg.
Then, they blew the egg out through the hole in the bottom.
This was not for the faint at heart! Most of the moms had to leave the room during this part.
Most of the children wanted to leave the room as well.
Glenna, on the other hand, was so quick with hers that I didn't even get her on film! She loves doing this, and often blows her egg out of the shell before she makes it for breakfast!
Next, the children sketched a design . . . .
. . . and then copied it on to the egg.
Some designs were quite complex and had to be simplified.
Then began the tedious process of covering the design in wax. They first considered which parts of the design they wanted to remain white. They used this small stylus with a funnel on top.
Scooping wax into the funnel, they would hold the stylus over a candle flame, melt the wax, and then quickly transfer the wax to the egg, bit by bit.
The eggs would then go into yellow dye, and the wax was applied to all parts they wanted yellow, then red dye, and lastly black dye.
Yes, this took a while!
Finally, they would hold their waxy, messy egg over the candle flame and begin to melt the wax, wiping it off on a paper towel. The result was a dyed egg with colorful designs!
They were encouraged to look up photos of Pysanky eggs on the internet. Wow! That's not easy!
Lessons we learned as moms were:
1. Blowing out the egg may have not been a good idea. Elise was heavy-handed and crushed two of them before her mom decided she could finish at home. Hard-boiled or un-blown may have worked better.
2. Scooping wax from a melted candle with a toothpick or q-tip worked as well as the stylus.
3. Tell the children that the majority of the egg will be black so they don't make elaborate designs using much wax. Instead, thin swirls or lines would have worked best in the white, yellow, and red. Even wide lines turned out scratchy-looking.
This art is specifically from the Ukraine, so hello, Hunsuckers!
5 comments:
I don't think the toothpicks were as good as the stylus; the wax would harden no matter how quickly I put it on my egg...
Blowing out the eggs was definitely nasty! The sound effects didn't make it any better either... :-)
tsaliti: the tsar's private island retreat.
Blowing out those eggs was disgusting!
I'm impressed! I think pysanki must be incredibly hard to make.
I would like that Russia book now...Although I am fairly certain that distance makes it difficult to loan to me... =(
I can do even better than that!
My friend BA has hers, and was asking if I knew anyone who wanted it. I could send you mine and hers and you could find someone to co-op with!
You would just have to order the craft kit from KONOS. It's worth it.
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