Ukrainian Easter Egg-stravaganza - the recap

Every year my mom hosts our annual Ukrainian Easter Egg-stravaganza. It is a time for food, family, friends, and most of all eggs! Yes, Easter Eggs! This year was the 26^th year of the event and it did not disappoint.

If you’ve never heard of Ukrainian Easter Eggs then shame on you allow me to explain a bit about them. It is the art of decorating eggs using beeswax and dye. The designs are often intricate and it can take up to several hours to complete a particularly complex egg (or 10 minutes if you just make polka dots). You apply the wax using a stylus (or kistka) and then dip the egg in the first color. After blotting the egg dry you apply more wax, then dip in the next color. You repeat each step several times, making the design more intricate and colorful. The final result is (usually) very beautiful eggs with multiple colors and designs.

Here are some examples:

My eggs, plus my husbands car egg (he rocks at making cars on eggs...among other things)

Aspiring hand models. I think they all have a future, no?

Just because she can

Jamalee's egg on the left, Wench's egg on the right

How awesome are these??! THAT is talent! 

(please note: Smidge's sister made these, my talent does not extend to bird drawings)

Bud's attempt at an Angry Bird. Not bad if you ask me!

I have hand modeling aspirations too!

Smidge had alien egg aspirations. She just HAD to get polka dots on her egg and if it means getting blobs (the bane of every UEE decorator) then by golly she's going to work with her blobs!

(Smidge, is that the only egg you made? Why do I not have more pictures for you?)

My best egg this year

I made this one for my Godmother

I like the purple

Wench was majorly jealous of my flowers. 

I'll teach you next year Wench!

This was my first attempt at this design. I have plans for next year! Oh, I have plans!

Seeing this in the picture makes me realize how unsymmetrical it is. Crap. Just focus on the pretty colors, k?

Wench's egg

My favorite of Wench's eggs

Well done Wench, well done!

Jamalee's egg

My favorite Jamalee egg! 

Excellent J, excellent!

We all really enjoy making eggs that’s what she said but mostly we enjoy each other’s company. I don’t know how many times I had to run to the bathroom before I peed myself from laughing so hard. (Also, my friends and cousin learned that it is in fact true that after kids it’s much harder not to pee yourself. You’re welcome ladies. Get your trampoline jumping in while you can!) From our hand modeling aspirations to our non-stop movie quotes we barely stopped laughing the entire time. We’ve decided that once a year is not enough for making eggs. We would like to institute more egg decorating holidays. We are thinking Christmas and Halloween are the best candidates. I think I could make some lovely Christmas themed eggs!

Until next year...

Lily