BLOG-How We Roll
- Published: April 16, 2017
This year, we got it done! The holiday weekend schedule is packed wall to wall but last night we carved out time to color eggs.
A dear friend of our daughters came over after dinner and together we started a pot of hot water to boil the eggs. As the water heated from 65 to 195 degrees, the girls set off for Dollar General with a $5 bill to pick up an egg coloring kit or two. They came back with two: One had five tablets of egg dye, a tube of gold polish, application sponges, and a tray for egg painting; the second had seven tablets of dye and a tube of silver polish.
We plunked the eggs into the prepared water bath and gave them 9 minutes to cook. Once they were done, I transferred the orbs to a pitcher half full with ice water to arrest the cooking process. We then set about preparing the egg dyes. We brought out our collection of small coffee cups each the perfect size for holding about 5 ounces of water plus an egg.
Only trouble was that the cups needed to hold water, egg, AND two tablespoons of white vinegar. We had a little problem with overflowing cups. After making a mess of the counter, we learned our lesson. We put the cups on a metal cooling tray and slid a rimmed cookie sheet below to catch the brilliant pink, blue, and green puddles.
We also put the paper towels we used to clean up to good use…wrapping eggs in water logged towels so that both the captured dye and texture of the towel transferred to the wrapped egg.
My daughter had great fun coloring the eggs Saturday night and collecting them from hiding places about the family living room in the early morning. As we prepared breakfast, we watched out the front window as our neighbors began their egg hunt in their side yard. Wanting to join them but not wanting to crash their family ritual. I grabbed our colored eggs for a second round of hiding and hunting in our backyard.
The morning light was lovely, the air deliciously moist and warm. The eggs nested into their individual nooks in a way that seemed to celebrate their own individuality. Where I saw country, city, and suburb, my daughter saw celestial bodies flung into exotic orbits—Saturn, Jupiter, Pluto, Earth, and Mars. I am perhaps surprised to find intense beauty in the handoff of a holiday tradition. That handoff can be an awkward business, yes most definitely. This spring morning we rolled with it and were rewarded with blasts of awesome color and a shimmering splash of shine.
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