Friday Egg: Etched Turtle Pair

Today's Friday Egg is a design you have seen before, but this time I started with a brown chicken egg. There are two turtles, one on each side, playfully chasing each other around the egg. I like the soothing greens and blues paired with the natural brown of the chicken egg.

First I applied wax to cover the brown of the eggshell, Then I etched the eggshell in a vinegar bath to reveal the white eggshell just underneath the brown layer and added wax to those areas where I wanted it to stay white. Then I did the same process through Key Lime and Turquoise and finally dyed the egg Black.

Friday Egg: Happy Owl

A completely contemporary egg this week!  I am jumping on the owl bandwagon with this owl on a leafy branch.  He was a lot of fun to make, just stripes and dots, nets and bars in bright and happy colors.  I am working with the gilding, so added some golden dots to the owl body as well as the dots in the background.

Hope you like him!  Happy Friday

Friday Egg: First of 2011

Happy New Year!

The first Friday egg of the year is a pretty little dark brown egg featuring a peacock on a  tree.  I really like the colors on this egg, especially the golden yellow.  I am having a hard time getting back on schedule, so I don't have a lot of time to blog today.  I need to go exercise - I started the Couch to 5K program yesterday and want to get a quick run in before I go to my kickbox class this evening.  

Enjoy the egg!

Friday Egg: Protective Red Ram

Red Ram on Black Background

I like the ram motif in traditional eggs. Spirals are traditionally seen as a protection symbol and the ram has it built right in!  This egg has a lot of protection motifs:  the "wolves teeth" that encircle the vertical eternity band as well as the tiny wolves teeth within the eternity band.  I have always like the color combination of red and white. It is so strong and jaunty and cheerful with no doubts about itself.

Side view

Top View

Bottom View

Penny for scale

I hope you have a lovely Friday.  The weather here is beautiful - sunny and in the 70's. I'm going to go have lunch with my husband and then come back and do a quick housecleaning for my daughter's birthday party tomorrow.  We are very happy that Scottyroo and Christini are coming to entertain the 22 cupcake-and-juice-fueled three-year-olds who will be running amok in our house tomorrow.

Friday Egg: Flying Turtle in Space!

A whimsical Friday Egg today!  It is a turtle with a traditional star design shell flying through a flower and dot filled space with his upside-down buddy on the other side.  The brightness of the colors against the black background remind me of folk art embroidery.   

I started the regular way with a white eggshell, then just kept adding new colors.  I washed the eggshell back down to white several times to ensure that the colors were bright and clear.  Sometimes the colors can get a bit muddy and dark if you do too many successive layers of dye without washing back to white as a background again.

Enjoy your sci-fi traditional zoological space exploration egg!

Happy Friday!

Friday Egg

A traditional pattern on a goose egg today, with some non-traditional colors.

I started with a white goose egg, and worked on a wide and intricate eternity band.  Next was Sunflower Yellow, Harvest Green, Bright Green, Peacock Blue, Harvest Orange, Scarlet and a final color of Turquoise.  I am not totally happy with this egg.  The final color looks uneven and blotchy.  I should have let it sit longer after the final dye bath. When I melt the wax off an egg that is still humid on the inside from a lot of dye baths, the humidity is forced through the pores of the egg when the air heats up and adversely affects the dye.  I like the plant under the feet of the deer and the eternity band turned out pretty well.  Sometimes it is difficult for me to get the geometry right on these wide bands because the squares squish up as they go around the more narrow top of the egg and can sometimes look awkward.