Vintage Easter Basket End Paper

Description of Printable Paper: restored bookend paper, Easter baskets, Spring baskets, flowers, for your personal crafts only, field of drawn rabbits, colors: peach, blue and yellow, very vintage, Read Terms of Use folks

Craft a Bird In a Nest Box

The Nesting Bird's Box by kathy grimm as seen from above.

       Although the assembly of this little box may be a bit challenging in at first, most of you will get the gist of it after a few seconds of trial and error. 

       Just imagine how different my box might look if I were to use paper or paint to decorate it? I loved the soft, tactile surface of this box. And the neutral brown shades gave it a bit of a modern twist in the finish, I think. It makes for an unusual Easter surprise!

Supply List:

• small empty, clean carton with a screw top spout
• paper or plastic bowl
• cardstock or cardboard
• masking tape
• white school glue
• plastic or styrofoam eggs
• yarn for nest, eggs and bird
• feathers
• scissors
• tissue paper 
• Sculpey clay (just a small amount)
• hot glue

Step-by-Step Directions:

1. Clean with warm warm water and soap a screw top spouted cream carton. Then cut the top off including a generous piece of cardboard surrounding it. (see photo below)
2. Cover the bowl's surface with masking tape on all sides.
3. Take the paper or plastic bowl and turn it upside down on a piece of cardboard and draw around the edge to estimate the circumference of it's opening. Cut around this circle leaving about a half inch in excess from the drawn circle. 
4. Remove the plastic lid from the carton piece and trace around it on top of the cardstock where ever you plan to have the box open. If your making a nest similar to mine, put it roughly in the middle.
5. Punch a whole in the center of this smaller outline with the tip of your scissors and cut the small whole out. Make sure that the lid top fits neatly through the hole.
6. Cover the top with masking tape. Cut out the hole shape if you cover this with the tape.
7. Now push the lid opening and it's attached backing through one side of the container's lid. (see photograph below)
8. Tape this secure and flip it over to screw on the plastic lid top.
9. Notch around the half inch cut so that the edge may be turned under  or up slightly and then squeeze glue around this edge and nestle it on to the top of the bowl. Mask the top edge firmly to the bowl top. Let this form dry.
10. Use glue and making tape to position and secure the plastic egg shells around the inside of the nest.
11. Now unscrew the lid from the top of the box. Crush the tissue into the shape of a small baby bird and glue this to the lid's top. Be careful not to get tape, glue or paper on the inside of the lid so that it will continue to screw on and off of it's lip properly. 
12. Mask this tiny bird with the tape.
13. Sculpt a bit of clay into a open beak for the bird. Fit it onto the small bird's head to make sure that it looks the way you want before baking it into it's permanent shape.
14. After baking this according to directions, let cool and then hot glue it to your baby bird.
15. Now use the white school glue to cover your nest with yarns of your own choosing. This will need to be done in stages, the bottom first and so on...  Let the glued surfaces dry between stages over several days. (see detailed photos below)
16. Include a secret letter and perhaps a bit of money inside your bird's nest box to give as a special gift for Easter or a child's birthday.

Left, "Clean with warm warm water and soap a screw top spouted cream carton.
 Then cut the top off including a generous piece of cardboard surrounding it." Right,
you can see that I have cut a whole measuring the same size of the lid into the
 top of the cardboard "nest."

Left and Center, "Now push the lid opening and it's attached backing through one side
 of the container's lid. Right, the opening of my Nest Box is neat, clean, and ready for decorating.

Left, "Now unscrew the lid from the top of the box. Crush the tissue into the shape of a small baby

 bird and glue this to the lid's top. Be careful not to get tape, glue or paper on the inside of the 

lid so that it will continue to screw on and off of it's lip properly." Right, "Use glue and making 

tape to position and secure the plastic egg shells around the inside of the nest."

       Above is the top of the screw top lid covered with furry brown yarn, a Sculpey beak and real feathers, made to look like a baby bird. I went for a simpler look and opted to leave the beak

 unpainted this time. In the photographs below you can see the yarn covered box from 

different points of view as well as a close up shot of the box with the led unscrewed.

Unscrew the bird to reveal the empty box within.

See the bird and nest full of eggs from different angles.

More Bird Crafts:

• Crayon Resist Parrots by Children
• How to draw a peacock, an ostrich and a blue jay, step-by-step
• Audubon's Legacy Lesson
• Free Jigsaw Transfer of A Parrot

Egg Rolling In Washington Over 100 Years Ago...

Getting ready to roll eggs across the lawn I guess!

       March and April in Washington spell for the adult the perfection of a climate which at its best no capital on earth can surpass. Color, fragrance, and an almost indefinable sense that the appropriate necessary mood is one of languid leisure are pervasive. The spring odors and flowers seem suddenly to flood the gardens and lawns. In the tiny six-by-two bed under a bay-window and in the stretches of living green by the river the daffodils have succeeded the crocus; hyacinths and flaring tulips fill the borders, and even the stems in the hedges are full of color. Over every tree there is a smoky veil where the swelling leaf-buds have blurred the winter tracery of bare twigs against the sky, but are not yet heavy enough to cast a shade.

       Only the children seem energetic, especially on Easter  Monday, the great day for Washington babies. Along Pennsylvania Avenue they stream‚ well dressed, nurse-attended darlings mingling with the raggedest little poor children that ever snatched an egg from a market-basket. The wide street looks as if baby-blossom time had come, for there are hundreds of children who on this special afternoon storm the grounds of the White House for their annual egg-rolling. Long ago the sport took place on the terraces below the Capitol, and a visitor to the city then wrote:

       "At first the children sit sedately in long rows; each has brought a basket of gay-colored hard-boiled eggs, and those on the upper terrace send them rolling to the line on the next below, and these pass on the ribbon-like streams to other hundreds at the foot, who scramble for the hopping eggs and hurry panting to the top to start them down again. And as the sport warms those on top who have rolled all the eggs they brought finally roll themselves, shrieking with laughter. Now comes a swirl of curls and ribbons and furbelows, somebody's dainty maid indifferent to bumps and grass stains. A set of boys who started in a line of six with joined hands are trying to come down in somersaults without breaking the chain. On all sides the older folk stand by to watch the games of this infant Carnival which comes to an end only when the children are forced away by fatigue to the point of exhaustion, or by parental order."

       When the games proved too hard a test for the grass on the Capitol terraces. Congress stopped the practice, and the President opened the slope back of the White House. No grown person is admitted unless accompanied by a child, but even under this restriction the annual crowd is great enough to threaten the survival of the event.

This film of babies tossing eggs for Easter was made 

by Thomas Edison, over 100 years ago!

• A Unusual White House Tradition
• The Easter Egg Roll
• More Egg Rolling footage at Thrifty Scissors and see twins at White House egg roll from years gone by...

Language of The Heart

       Flowers speak the language of the heart. They convey the most personal and individual sentiment, while appealing to common universal taste and imagination. This characteristic of flowers, fits them especially for uses of religion and of church service, since they both express private affections of the giver and enrich symbolism of the altar. A basket or cross of flowers can say all the heart wishes to say, and say it without obtruding personal feeling. In medieval times flowers spoke a definite language, the interpretation of which has seemed almost lost. The palm--the ancient classical symbol of victory--was early assumed by Christians as a symbol of martyrdom. It was placed into hands of those who suffered in the cause of truth, as expressing their final victory over powers of sin and death. It also figured on tombs of early martyrs.

Singer, Debbie King.

Easter Animal Napkin Rings

Above are the finished versions of the simple fabric napkin rings for Easter dinner.

This simple sewing project may be ac-
complished in one or two afternoons prior
to a party by a child as young as 10
or 11 years old.

       It's important for parents involve their children in both the presentation of a family party and also in the execution of a party, especially if they are old enough to help out. Young people can easily decorate a table setting for a holiday event with things like: floral displays, name place tags and napkin rings.

        I've included here a sewing project that would be simple enough for a preteen to put together for their family Easter table. The felt bunnies and chicks came from a Hobby Lobby and the fabric from a local Joanne's store. Both items together did not cost me more than five dollars.
       The craft takes a little advanced planning. You will need to probably color coordinate your fabric selection with the dishes you plan to use. Let your child take a sample plate to the fabric store and hold it up next to the fabrics in order to choose something appropriate. Give him or her several days to complete this sewing project, if they have never attempted to sew before. Their stitching doesn't need to be perfect but you should give them time to practice if they are to attempt it to completion without parental help.
       Cut the fabric into strips measuring approximately 3 inches wide and 5 inches long. Allow for a seam of about half an inch. With the right sides together, sew around the perimeter of the strips after folding these in half and leave one end open in order to turn the finished tube inside out. Whip stitch the ends shut and then stitch both finished edges together with a blanket stitch. Iron or glue the felt animals onto the napkin rings. Insert pastel colored napkins (fabric or paper) and set the Easter table for company.
       If your youngsters enjoy this kind of project, why not assign the responsibility to them every year?

More Easter Crafts for the Family Dinner:

• Easter Flower Arrangements - by Patty Roller Designs
• Easter Bunny Vase - by Rittners Floral School
• Kids can design an Easter garden for the table
• How to make Easter bunny folded napkins
• A folded rose napkin tutorial 
• Folding swans from napkins 
• Easter Table Setting by Christy Rost Cooks 
• Fast and Fun Easter Centerpieces from the Supermarket

How to craft paper doily butterflies

      These little butterflies are easy to craft. All you will need are a few pom-poms, wiggly eyes and paper doilies. I hand-colored my doilies for the blue butterfly and left another set white for the second version of this craft.

      You will need to accordion fold two paper dollies and glue four pom-poms on top of each other and let these dry over night before assembling the butterfly. Use a very tacky white glue for this project and it will prove far less frustrating to complete. You could use a hot glue if you'd like, but this glue is not safe for little ones to handle.

Vintage Velveteen Book End Paper

These bunnies are perfect for an Easter greeting card or two.

Description of Printable Paper: restored bookend paper, from an old copy of "The Velveteen Rabbit" for your personal crafts only, field of drawn rabbits, colors: peach, blue and lime green, very vintage, Read Terms of Use folks

Decorating The Old Welsh Family Cupboard for Easter

       This year I decided to decorate my Welsh cupboard in whites and pastel colors. Because Easter is so early this year, these decorations actually went up during a birthday celebration in our home. Since then the lilies have gone and the hydrangeas have dried nicely.

This old cupboard was my mother-in-laws.

The old china is from a relative whom, sadly, moved away.

I picked up this egg candy dish for five dollars at a flee market this year.

Hydrangeas are some of my most favorite flowers.

The woven, porcelain basket was acquired
 several years ago at another flee market.

One of my happy finds at a local antique mall, a covered
 porcelain dish covered with three dimensional daisies.

White Easter lilies are now gone but I
have this lovely photo to remember them.

More China Patterns for Easter Dinner:

• Spring and Easter Table Setting Ideas
• Two Easter Tables - I love the yellow table cloths
• Love this yellow bumble bee tablescape

Tulip Table Settings for Easter/Spring

       Decorated crepe paper tulip cup cake holders and tulip favors may be happily arranged on this spring table trimmed for Easter. Yellow tulips are cut out and appliqued on the circular paper cover; the tulip border is combined with plain yellow paper for the runner and again appears in the hanging dome decoration. Fringe cut and then scalloped hangs between the border pieces on the chandelier decoration, and narrow streamers extend from it to the sides of the room.

A flower pot covered with two different colors of crepe, (stripes)
 and filled with paper tulips in which favors are attached,
makes this little display unique. These little coordinating
 accessories: potted tulip place holder and cup cake holders
complete the theme.

A sophisticated tulip arrangement for

 your Easter table from Bloomtube DIY.

Decorate Your Easter Table With a Zoo!

Mrs Marchand puts the finishing touches on a porcupine. 
On the table stand a finished ostrich and deer.

      Berthe Marchand used her ingenuity. Needing something original for the Easter table—something for the children to admire—she hit on the idea of making an entire zoo of animals, using colored Easter eggs and other odd bits of material easily obtained for a few cents at any stationer’s.

      Why don’t you do the same? It just takes patience, nimble fingers, and extreme care in handling the eggs— which can be dropped only once!

More Animal Shaped Easter Eggs:

• Birds from Russia
• Easter critters by Lia Griffith
• Owl painted Easter eggs
• Octopus Easter Eggs
• Four little bird egg ideas
• Eggs painted like farm animals: cow, pig, chicken and bunny 

More Fun Egg Video:

• Screaming Eggs and Scared Eggs 

Far left, Making a porcupine. A paper-shell nut is inserted into a clay neck on an egg. Next, the peanut legs are being carefully affixed to the roughed-out figure. Head feet, and all parts of the body not covered by clay are painted. And last, after he's got his paper eyes and comb, "Porky" receives his quills.

The finished porcupine with toothpicks for quills.

Left, Mr. Penguin. Egg, peanuts, clay, felt toothpicks. Center, The giraffe
has neck and legs of red soda straws, of course. Right, The kangaroo,
above, has a yellow-painted-egg body, a cotton pouch, and peanut legs.

The swan, just above, is made of egg, cotton,
paper fringing, and colored pipe-cleaners.

Left, The ostrich--with egg body, pipe-cleaner legs and nick, ad a
ball -with-a-hole head. Right, The most fee-ro-cious lion ever made.
Walnut head and peanut feet.

What to Do With Left Over Easter Eggs

What to do with all those hard-boiled eggs?

       All the traditions connected with the Easter egg, its decoration, cooking and eating, are, of course, decidedly old world, and yet there is some myth among the legends of the Inca Indians which tells of a magic egg and how it may be found in some mysterious spot, and of its wonderful power. Whether or not this is one of the superstitions of the far east which Manco Capac brought with him from the other side of the Pacific is altogether unknown, but certain it is that in Asia, Africa and Europe feasts were kept in most ancient times when the egg played a prominent part. The Jews used eggs in their feast of the Passover long before the coming of Christ. In Persia colored eggs are presented at the celebration of the Solar New Year's, and extremely ancient custom with this people.

       From Germany comes the singular connection of a rabbit with the Easter eggs. It is believed that this little animal steals into the house when all is quiet and hides a store of pretty eggs in most impossible places, giving the children, who must search for them, a great deal of trouble and excitement in finding them. The house mother prepares by procuring a quantity of eggs and colors them herself by wrapping them in colored calicoes, some plain and some figured.

       To the country boy or girl of America Easter or "Paas," in rural vernacular, resolves itself first and foremost into a contest to see who can accumulate the greatest store of eggs, and secondly, who can eat the most.

More Egg-cellent Recipes: Video: 

• Dyed Deviled Eggs - use very pale pastel colors only!
• How to make Easter Chick Deviled Eggs - These eggs look like little chicks still in their shells!
• Red Hot Deviled Eggs - Make sure to use eggs that have been dyed red or purple previously for this one
• Scotch Eggs make marvelous use of left over eggs for any holiday
• Baby buggy deviled eggs? 

Easter Day Word Scramble

You can enlarge this puzzle in a Word Doc. to make it easier to read.

The answer key below is in white text. Cut and paste it into a Word Doc, then change it's color to a dark type if you wish to print it out. Otherwise just highlight it with your mouse to see the answers.

Answer key: bloom, thunder, blow, leaping, grave, sun,world, grim, Sepulchre,breath, alive, Nazareth, message, shields, casts, strength

"The Rejected Christ" by Goetze

For further inquiries about the original work, go to the Stranraer Museum.

At the exhibition of the Royal Academy, in London, the great canvas by Sigismund Goetze, entitled “Despised and Rejected of Men,” (right) has created an artistic sensation. It is declared to be a “powerful and terribly realistic presentment of Christ.” in a modern setting, and is described by a writer in The Christian Commonwealth (London), as follows: 

In the center of the canvas is the Christ, standing on a pedestal, bound with ropes, while on either side passes the heedless crowd. A prominent figure is a richly vested priest, proudly conscious of the perfection of the ritual with which he is starving his higher life. Over the shoulder of the priest looks a stern-faced divine of a very different type. Bible in hand, he turns to look at the gospel has missed its spirit,and is as far astray as the priest whose ceremonial is to him anathema. The startled look on the face of the hospital nurse in the foreground is very realistic; so is the absorption of the man of science, so intent on the contents of his test-tube that he had not a glance for the Christ at his side. One of the most striking figures is that of the thoughtless beauty hurring from one scene of pleasure to another; and spurning the sweet-faced little ragged child who is offering a bunch of violets. In rejecting the plea of the child who knows that the proud woman is rejecting the Christ who has identified himself forever with the least of these little ones. The only person in the whole picture who has found time to pause is the mother seated on the steps of the pedestal with her baby in her arms, and we can not but feel that when she has ministered to the wants of her child she will spare a moment for the lover of little children who is so close to her. In the background stands an angel with bowed head, holding the cup which the world He loved to the death is still compelling the Christ to drink, while a cloud of angel faces look down upon the scene with wonder. As the visitor turns away he is haunted with the music of Stainer’s “Crucifixion,” “Is it nothing to you, all ye that pass by?”

Related Content:

• The Passing Over of Sin IN Christ
• Christ the Redeemer!

Weave a Pine Needle Basket for A Unique Easter Keepsake

      Below, I've included an article from 1898 describing two sisters that made their living from the meticulous crafting of pine needle baskets. These baskets were first crafted by indigenous peoples long ago but American women soon learned the art of weaving these little beauties during the late 1800s. Pine needle baskets are still highly sought after by collectors today; perhaps you may find  inspiration here to continue the art of weaving a few treasures for your friends and family this Easter? 

Basket Making for Profit, Two New York Girls Have Discovered a New Road to Fortune Which Other Women May Follow, St. Louis Globe-Democrat, 1898

      If you have ever bought a basket of candy in Mexico your attention has no doubt been attracted to the dainty basket as much as to the sweets. The Indians and Mexicans and the "cracker" women of the mountains of the South are expert basket makers, but it is only quite recently that a young woman of New York, trying to solve the difficult poroblem of how a woman may support herself, was attracted to this employment.

a pine needle basket

      While visiting at Aiken, S. C., Miss Mabel Compbell and her sister Stella observed the pretty baskets made of pine needles that were sold at the hotel by the country women. Miss Stella made a little basket after spending a day with the women who taught her, and before she left Aiken became quite expert. The following year Miss Mabel went out West, 'way out in the Indian country, as teacher in a family. The Indians in the neighborhood made many beautiful baskets. At Christmas she sent her sister Stella the prettiest basket to be found. Miss Stella was a typewriter, but disliked the work very much. She suggested to her sister that she learn all she possibly could concerning the making of the baskets, which she did, and also about the curing of the grasses, and in fact, invented many patterns of her own. She forwarded her sister a dozen of the baskets which she had made herself, and a lot of colored grass, in order that she might try her own hand at the art of weaving. Miss Stella combined the Indian and Southern material into a basket of an original design, which she sold to a florist for a good price. Afterward Miss Campbell went to Asheville, N. C., and pursued her quest for information concerning basket making. She returned to New York to find her sister had lost her position, her employer having gone to the war. Florists were consulted, and their orders were so large that it was decided to give all their time to the work.

      A month ago they were obligated to engage a young woman to assist them, and they regard the business as in quite a flourishing condition. They have many more orders on hand than they can fill at present. The baskets are in great demand in other cities than New York--in fact, the largest order they have had to fill came from Washington-and the baskets will be used wherever flowers or fancy candies are sold. They anticipate orders from Chicago and Boston. When the winter season begins it is probable that they will take several girls into their employ, and will be obliged to go into larger quarters. Their summer home is a cottage in the Adirondacks, and they work in an ideal way, out on the veranda, or even taking the work into the woods, sometimes staying for several days at a time.

      A party of young ladies visited them the other day, and, while it was impossible to fill the order they wished to leave, a bright suggestion of one of the girls was well received. She said she would like to take a course of lessons in the art of basket-weaving to add to her other accomplishments, embroidery and painting. Miss Campbell thinks it will be profitable to have classes in New York this winter.

      Miss Campbell, when asked if the work is hare, shrugging her shoulders, said that she had never seen anything worth while that was not hard. There is some drawback to everything, but this work is not so confining as other work taken up by women. It can be accomplished at home for one thing, it is clean, and it does not strain the back or muscles. It must be learned like everything else, the principal requirement being the ability to invent new shapes. Miss Campbell and her sister have found it pleasanter and much more remunerative than either teaching or typewriting, those occupations most affected by the women who are not so fortunately situated as to have homes of their own and a competency.

Resources:

• How to Make a Pine Needle Basket
• Instructions for Round-bottom Pine Needle Coil Baskets

"Watch as Susan Topham takes you through each 
step of a creative and relaxing DIY project."

"The Third Nest"

The Third Nest: A Easter Story

      It was a late Easter and an early spring. The combination had brought the festival of the resurrection into the heart of the bloom and blossom of the season, instead of the bluster and the blow. The shadows were already heavy beneath the trees, though the tints of the leaves were still delicate. Long blooms hung from the horse chestnuts.

Kirche St. Martin in Zillis,
Kanton Graubünden.

      Out at the water works grounds, beds of flaming tulips broke the level green' Persian lilacs flung out the sweetness of their pinkish sprays, and the snow ball bushes were masses of cream-white. From neighboring grounds came the heavy odor of myriads of apple and peach blossoms, the apple trees almost purple with the density of their branches and blooms, the peach trees slender spears of pink. And, as a background, the glitter of Lake St. Clair, through the branches, until far off it melted into the sky.

      A boy with a dark, foreign face, delicate and refined in spite of his evident neglect and the associations of the street which the violin under his arm suggested--picturesque in the contrast-sat on a seat near a tulip bed. He was looking dreamily at the flowers. He loved them, and it was their attraction that held him there when he ought to have been playing his violin and earning something.

      The flowers made him think of the old cemetery behind St. Martin's church in Zuchvill, in Switzerland. There were so many flowers there that the tourists came from afar to visit it. All the headstones in that cemetery were alike-that was the village law-except one, a plain granite shaft, beneath which was buried the heart of Kosciusko. How often his father had taken him there and told him the story of Kosciusko. He looked at the glimmering strip of lake which he could see and tried to imagine that it was the Aare river, the beautiful Aare which flows through the valley north of Zuchvill.

      But the illusion was not good. Down on the bank of the Aare the violets grew thickly, and he knew there were none on the lake shore, for he had just looked to see; beyond the gleaming river there was the Weissenstein jutting out from the Jura mountains, stretching along the north, blue almost as the sky itself. There was no stretch of pine forest to the left either, and behind him no village nor beechwood-the beechwood where he and Marie used to gather beechnuts. Around him it was beautiful, but it was not the Zuchvill meadow. Oh, that meadow--there was something about the day that him feel like crying, and he had a queer, dizzy sense in his head. It could not be that he was hungry. A boy who has a good breakfast ought to have enough until supper time. He put his hand in his pocket and took out some change, only $1.22. His lodging, together with breakfast and supper, was $1.50. and today was Saturday. It must be that it was only thirst, so he went and got another drink. Then he resolutely drew his bow across the strings. Perhaps the policeman would let him play here a little while. There were a few visitors, he might make a few cents without leaving the dear flowers. Under the spell of the violin the illusions he had sought became clearer, the surroundings became more and more like Zuchvill.

      He remembered one never-to-be-forgotten time, when his father took him out for a little walk, his father, who lived in his memory as a great, big man, with a very black beard, and a voice like no other, so kind and so caressing.

      As they walked along, his father told him stories of Poland, beautiful, suffering Poland, from which he was exiled. Some day it should be free-then he would take his little son up in his arms and kiss him, telling him to try to be a great and good man some day, so he could help to free it. And they two had walked along the Zuchvill meadow together--it was in the spring of the year, when the little flowers bloomed everywhere and he had let go his father's hand to gather flowers. When he came back his father was lying on the ground, he thought asleep, so he lay beside him and slept, too. But there was a difference in their sleep.

      He had not forgotten a detail, for over and over his baby lips had to tell to his mother the last words of his father, and she in turn had told him the reason of the tragedy.

      They were trying new guns at Solothurn, the city of which Zuchvill was really a suburb. His father, who had been away for a few weeks, had not heard of the proposed experiment, and did not notice the signs marking danger line. Daily his mother reproached herself for not warning him, and daily, also, she told her boy of his father until the memory of him became an ideal than which there could be none better.

      After his father's death his mother and he had gone to live at the inn, "Die Schnepfe." She was his teacher in all things and his companion. She loved the violin and she taught him to love it. The little Marie, the child of the innkeeper, was his playmate and fellow student. His mother left, just enough, by saving, to send him to school so that he might become a great man, as his father had wished.

      They lived there a long, long time, and it all was a long time ago. So it seemed to him, yet he was but twelve; and they might have lived on there forever, he and his good mamma, if it had not been for her brother. Here the boy gave his bow a vicious jerk. His mamma had been rich, but her brother had done something with her money, and even after that he would send her letters that made her cry. Here brother was in America, and one day she said they must go to him. When they came to New York her brother was in the hospital, his mother said, and cried. After a while he died. He knew now that it had been the prison hospital. When he wanted to go back his mother said she had no money. Then she had tried to get work to do, and they had lived in a little room in a big building, on a dirty street, nothing like the beautiful Zuchvill, yet it was good enough, so long as his mother lived.
       But she became ill and he sold papers and between times played his violin on the streets. His mother had said that it was begging, but when your mother is ill, what will you do? So he went on playing and did not tell her.
      When she was dying she had told him to remember his father's example and to be true to his faith and his country. She told him it would be better to leave the great wicked city, now that he was alone, and go to Detroit. She had heard that there were many Poles there. Besides, she wanted her boy to grown up where he could sometimes see trees and grass and sky.
      So he played his way to Detroit. It was only six weeks since his mother's death, but it seemed very long since then.
      He played on, Polish airs and Swiss melodies. He knew little American music. The Americans have no songs, he thought they do not need them. Only those who have no country and no father and no mother, who are hungry and homeless, can sing; or, if they have beautiful hills and mountains, as in Switzerland, to echo back the yodels, they might sing for joy.
      Out of the corner of his eyes he saw a little shadow edging steadily nearer. The shadow had curls, a broad hat and skirts, and then another smaller shadow in knickerbockers crept near it. The boy turned his head a little. It might have been Marie of 'Die Schnepfe," at whom he was looking, for just so he remembered her as she was when he and his mother came to America. He had been playing life into his memories, and the fancy seized him to make believe that this little girl was his old playmate. He smiled a little to reassure her for his sudden turn, and she, on her part, came a little nearer and leaned comfortably against a tree opposite him.
      Then he began playing a little song which he and Marie used to sing. It was in the Swiss dialect and composed by a friend of his mother's. It belonged to Zuchvill, and to no other place as much as did the meadow and the beechwood and the view of the Weissenstein.
      The girl's little brother toddled in between them, his brow in a puzzled pucker as he looked at the violin from different points. But Brunislav looked at her eyes across the little fellow's head and played and sang with all his soul. At the end of the stanza he broke out into a joyous yodel, and the girl yodelt too, high and clear. He was making believe that she was Marie and he feared to break the spell if he asked her questions, so he sang the next stanza--this time she sang it all with him.
      There was a bond between them now, and he laid down his violin and asked in the Swiss dialect:
      "Where did you learn that?"
      "From father," she answered.
      "Does he come from Zuchvill?"
      The little girl nodded.
      "Were you ever there?"
      She shook her head. Her mother's injunction against speaking to strangers was severe, and she was shy. It puzzled her to decide whether this boy who sang her father's song was a stranger or not. She hesitated, with the usually fatal results. The lonely and homesick Brunislav kept on talking and she answered less timidly each time.
      "Did your father ever tell you about Kosciusco's heart?"
      She shook her head.
      Brunislav looked incredulous. She seemed far less like Marie than a few minutes ago.
      "Did he ever tell you about the Weissenstein?"
      She nodded. That was better, he thought.
      "Did he ever tell you about the convent down by Solothurn, where the children used to find the Easter eggs in the nests on Easter Sunday morning, and where they used to give us Easter cakes baked like little lambs?"
      She shook her head. "But," she said, "Franzi," pointing to her brother, "and I build nests and mother bakes the Easter lamb cakes for us. Does your mother bake any for you?"
      "I have no mother?"
      "Oh," said the girl, and thought awile.
      Bruinslav started the conversation again by asking, "And do you go out early Easter morning to whistle for the hare that lays the Easter eggs?"
      "No, we wake up too late; father whistles instead."
      Brunislav smiled a superior smile. He was twelve and she was eight, and he had a better idea who put the Easter eggs into the nests than she had.
      She went on: "Franzi and I came over here to see if we could find some nice, green moss for our nests."
      "I'll help you," said Brunislav.
      "Do you build nests, too?"
      "No."
      "Why not?"
      Brunislav tried to think of an answer that would not reveal his lack of faith in the mythical hare.
      "I have no place," he said, at last.
      " I will let you make a nest in our yard," said the girl. "Maybe the hare will find it there, if you put your name in it."
      He did not know what to say, so he was silent.
      "Don't you want to?" she asked, aggrieved.
      "I will if you want me to," he answered, gallantly. By the time they had found the mosses and returned to their home Franzi was hungry, so the girl took him into the house for a lunch. A few minutes later she came back with him, a cookie in each of his hands. Brunislav was still telling himself that he was thirsty, but it was very hard to do so and watch Franzi eating. Women are quick, even in miniature. The little girl ran back into the house and returned with several cookies and divided with him.
      The extra number of cookies consumed made her scrupulous again as to what her mother would say if she knew, and she wanted to hurry her guest.
      "I'll build your nest," she said. From the depths of her pocket she produced a stubby pencil and a bit of druggist's blue wrapping paper. "Write your name on this, she said, as if conferring a special honor in the color, "and I'll put it in the nest for you. When you come tomorrow morning sing "Am Morga Frueh.' Father likes that," she added, with feminine finesse.
      "Is you name Marie?" he asked.
      "Yes," she said.
      Some latent instinct of chivalry made the boy take her little hand and kiss it. Then he went away.

*   *   *   *   *   *   *

      On Easter morning John Kulle, Marie's father, with a basket of bright-colored eggs on his arm, was looking for the nests constructed by Marie and Franzi.
      He found each with a label in Marie's very primitive handwriting. But close by there was a third. Strange, of what were the children thinking? He picked up the bit of blue paper, and the name on it gave him a creepy sensation.
      Brunislav Bernaski!"
      He had a European respect for the nobility, and Brunislav Bernascki, though that of a landless and exiled man, was a great name in Zuchvill fifteen years before. Moreover, he had heard of the accident and death.
      He went into the front yard and nervously investigated the lilac bushes, until such time when Marie should get up and he could watch developments.
      Presently there rang out, high and jubilant, "Am Morga Frueh," with its joyous yodel. Surely this was supernatural.
      Later, when Marie got up, she found her friend of yesterday talking earnestly to her father. He staid to breakfast and came back after mass, and staid to dinner and to supper, and the next day he went to work for her father, who owned a flourishing bakery, and stayed at their house for good, to Marie's delight.
      The teachings of his father and mother had been too stern to turn him only to music, and Brunislav is studying law. If he cannot free Poland, he can be the friend of his people in this country. Will he marry Marie? Probably. for The Saint Paul Daily Globe by Eugene Uhlrich, 1896

Traditional Egg Games for Easter Parties

       The giving of eggs at Easter, or the spring festival, is one of the most widely-known, as it is also one of the oldest, of the customs associated with spring. From the remotest times the egg has stood to the Eastern nations as the symbol of the universe, and its breaking at that time as represented the opening of the new life of the year. the usage of interchanging eggs during the spring season has been referred by some writers for its origin to the egg games of the Romans, which they celebrated at the time of our Easter, when they ran races in an egg-shaped ring and the victor received eggs as his prize. The Israelites used eggs in their feast of the Passover long before the coming of Christ. In Persia colored eggs are presented at the celebration of the solar new year, and extremely ancient custom with this people.

      But to Christians the egg stands as the universal symbol of the Resurrection. There is a tradition that in Christian countries many hundreds of years ago the Church prohibited the use of eggs during the forty days of Lent, but as the heretical hen did not cease to lay a large quantity of eggs were found to have accumulated at the end of the period of abstinence. These were usually given to the children and in order to render them more attractive they were dyed with bright colors or otherwise ornamented. 

      A favorite game was to knock two eggs together, and whichever broke became the property of him who held the other. Of course, this would not profit the winner much if the eggs were in a fluid state, and out of this dilemma arose the custom of boiling them hard. In English folk traditions, the game is known as "shackling", "jarping" or "dumping."  As with any other game, it has been a subject of cheating; eggs with cement core, alabaster, and even marble eggs have been reported. 

      Egg rolling, or an Easter egg roll is a traditional game played with eggs at Easter. Different nations have different versions of the game, usually played with hard-boiled, decorated eggs. The pre-Christian Saxons had a spring goddess eostre, whose feast was held on the Vernal Equinox, around 21 March. Her animal was the spring hare, and the rebirth of the land in spring was symbolized by the egg. Pope Gregory the Great ordered his missionaries to use old religious sites and festivals and absorb them into Christian rituals where possible. The Christian celebration of the Resurrection of Christ was ideally suited to be merged with the Pagan feast of eostre and many of the traditions were adopted into the Christian festivities. In England, Germany and other countries children traditionally rolled eggs down hillsides at Easter this may have become symbolic of the rolling away of the rock from Jesus Christ’s tomb before his resurrection. This tradition, along with others such as the Easter Bunny, were taken to the New World by European settlers. 

Eastern roll eggs in the White House South lawn in 1929.

Easter egg hunt in Wuxi, Jiangsu (1934)

 

       Egg hunt is a game during which decorated eggs, real hard-boiled ones or artificial, filled with or made of chocolate candies, of various sizes, are hidden in various places for children to find. The game may be both indoors and outdoors. When the hunt is over, prizes may be given out for various achievements, such as the largest number of eggs collected, for the largest or smallest egg, for the most eggs of a specific color, consolation prizes, booby prizes, etc. Eggs are placed with varying degree of concealment, to accommodate children of varying ages. In South German folk traditions it was customary to add extra obstacles to the game by placing them into hard-to reach places among nettles or thorns. 

      It is the custom in most German families on Easter-eve to place candies and eggs in a nest and then conceal it in their homes or in their gardens in order for the children, who often rise at the break of day on Easter morning to delight in seeking the sweet treasures. The older boys and girls join in a similar egg hunt game, which of course, has its superstitions for lovers. There is a rhyme that accompanies this "lovers" egg hunt:

Draw the egg of violet hue,

Means friends fond and true.

Pink will bring you luck,

A lover full of pluck.

Gladly take the egg of green,

Good fortune soon will be seen.

Wealth and happiness with the egg of gray, 

Keep it and hide it safely away.

The egg of blue

Means lovers few.

Do not touch the egg of red:

If you do you'll never wed.

A lover this very night,

If you draw the egg of white.

You'll marry in another town.

If you choose the egg of brown.

        There were a variety of egg dances. In one version eggs are laid on the ground or floor and the goal is to dance among them damaging as few as possible and in a second version the goal was to roll an egg out of a bowl while keeping within a circle drawn by chalk and then flip the bowl to cover the egg. This had to be done with the feet without touching the other objects placed on the floor.

Craft Basket Weave Rubbings for Easter Egg Pictures

      I made these Easter baskets from crayon rubbings and a simple basket stencil that I cut from cardboard.  Then I pasted a half dozen Easter eggs into my baskets after cutting egg shapes from decorative papers. This simple Easter egg, basket craft can be accomplished by students as young as six or seven, but I would recommend it for students in second through fourth grade.

Supply List:

• crayons
• construction paper
• decorative papers
• markers and pencils
• white glue
• Woven patterned surfaces on placemats, baskets and glass or plastic plates if you can find them
• scissors

Directions:

1. Cut and trace a basket stencil. Make this shape simple and with plenty of volume sot that a rubbed texture will be obvious once the project is complete. 
2. Trace and cut the basket shape from yellow or brown construction paper. 
3. Then place the cut basket shape on top of a woven textured surface and then rub the side of a darker crayon firmly across the surface. 
4. Draw additional details onto your paper basket's handle and paste it onto an additional sheet of paper for the background.
5. Then cut and trace egg pattern onto decorative papers for your Easter eggs. You could also use wrapping paper, wallpaper, etc... for these paper eggs. Use your imagination!
6. Paste these paper Easter eggs into your basket picture.

"The weave pattern on these Easter basket is created by rubbing crayons across the surface of paper laid on the top of a Depression glass plate." Depressionware is a marvelous surface for children to make rubbings with. Don't use anything too valuable however, they may break the surface accidentally.

More Art Projects Made From Textured Rubbings:

• Craft a Fall Landscape Using Leaf Rubbings

video about rubbing textures

A Pink Feather Tree Decorated For Easter

See pink feather tree from three angles.

      Above I have posted a few photos of my "pink feather tree" decorated for Easter. Sometimes I display this Easter egg tree against a wall in a narrow spot, such as the one shown here. The tree stands upon a early American writing desk that once belonged to my mother-in-law and now sits in my dining room. There is little room to spare on top of it's narrow level desk top, so the adjustable branches of this tree suit the space perfectly! I've included mouth-blown glass eggs, doily butterflies and an additional variety of handcrafted Easter eggs on it's pink pastel branches.

• See also our family's green and white feather trees here...
• Read how to make a doll-size egg tree also

A few of the mouth-blown glass Easter eggs that hang on the pink feather tree.

At one time I had entire sets of these sweet little glass bees and butterflies.
 Now there are only two remaining. I purchased them originally from a garden
 nursery and then wired them for my Easter trees.