Last year I was really struggling with how to celebrate Easter while also maintaining my status as an evil, plastic-hating, sugar-denying shrew of a mother. This kind of malevolence doesn’t just happen, you know. It’s carefully planned and cultivated. Deprivation like this takes work, dammit.
Eventually my family saved me, and I wrote about the sustainable easter-egg tradition we came up with because I was so in love with it. It turns out you were too, and so many of you mentioned wanting to do it for your kids next Easter that I thought I would post it again as we approach April, in case you’d forgotten.
(What I am trying to say is that you have definitely forgotten. You’re a mom. We have awesomely toned arms and almost saintly amounts of patience, but, unfortunately, the memory span of goldfish. Fair trade? Sundress season says yes!)
Anyway. Here it is, my reminder post, or a new post for those of you who weren’t around last year!
What happened as Easter 2014 approached was this: Olive was about 18 months old and I really wanted her to have an Easter egg hunt, obviously, but the idea of buying those plastic eggs, or cheap foil-wrapped chocolate ones really didn’t appeal to me. I’m not religious, so skipping the whole Easter bunny thing in favour of focusing on the Christian element of the holiday didn’t make much sense, either.
My mom and sisters saved my hippie butt by coming up with the genius idea to paint our own wooden Easter eggs that could be re-used for each year’s egg hunt. I absolutely loved this idea. Last year we all sat down one afternoon and painted the eggs with an assortment of designs. It was so much fun to create a family tradition like this together, and Olive had an incredible time hunting them all down.
This year I am going to order a few more, I’ll do a few and the cool part is that this year Olive is old enough that she can paint some of her own, too! Plus, as an added bonus, this whole egg-painting thing combines a fun Easter craft with the egg hunt preparation itself – two birds (eggs?) with one stone!
Basically, you are winning Easter 2015 if you do this.
I like things to be consistent, so I am sticking with the same sized wooden eggs that we had last year, but for anyone of the nature-loving sort who is planning on starting this tradition I thought that going out and collecting a bunch of similarly-sized pebbles to paint would work, too.
If you do want to order some eggs though, I have a treat for you! Claudia, the owner of the SnugglyMonkey boutique where we purchased ours, has graciously provided a promo code for Sweet Madeleine readers to receive 10% off any purchase. How egg-citing! (I’m so, so sorry. I couldn’t deny myself just one egg-related pun.)
Enter the promo code “SWEET10” at the checkout for 10% off your order, and then please post some pictures of your eggs to the Sweet Madeleine facebook page – I’d love to see how many Martha Stewarts we have out there! (And by “Martha Stewarts” of course, I mean women like me who have grandiose plans for their crafts and then gradually devolve into deep spirals of shame and disappointment as the creation falls way, way below the inspiration for it, meaning that you are obviously failing at life and possible even motherhood. Yayyyy, crafts!)
Happy hunting!
(This is not a sponsored post.)
10 Comments
Such a cool idea! What kind of paint did you use? And how did you manage to paint the egg while holding it and not smudge the paint?
I will check with my sister, but I think we just used acrylic paints and a non-toxic modge podge polish over top (in case Olive tried to gnaw on them 😉
As for the painting, everyone had their own systems, some used an egg holder created from tape, some did one half at a time, and others smudged everything and then just painted over it while swearing and crying (ahem).
But then there’s no candy inside :(. Or is there…
I know – the only downside! Last year we got her a really nice little chocolate bunny from the farmer’s market, and I think I will do the same this year. But the appeal of this activity may wear off as Olive grows up and discovers what she’s been missing 😉
I’ll have you know I DID remember and I have rather flabby arms. Yay, Canadian winter that lasts so long I will forget what a sundress looks like? :/
ANYWAY: I actually looked for wooden eggs at a craft shop the other day to try this and was disappointed that none appeared amongst the pseudo-craft supplies (you know the kind – foam kits of stuff you stick together and call handmade?). So, thanks for the discount!
Yep, I think I’ll actually do this this year. I love a tradition. I especially love starting my own and stealing ideas from other people. I will have to include a chocolate of some kind… plus a few for myself!
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Would you mind letting us readers know where we can buy this polish? I’ve been to countless craft stores and everyone looks at me a little silly when I ask if they carry a foodsafe polish. Thanks in advance!
I checked with my sister, and it was just modge-podge! It’s non-toxic 🙂 My mistake, I will update the post and I’m sorry for sending you on a wild goose chase!!
I like this idea, I think I will try to remember it for next year. My son is 13 months now, so I don’t think finding the eggs will hold any interest for him. Something you might try once Olive gets older is the weird British way of doing Easter egg hunts (I’m an American living in England right now), they do a scavenger hunt with clues that lead to a big Easter surprise, usually a big chocolate egg, but you could do anything that suits your style for the prize.