The Easter Egg And The Easter Hare...

Bunnies should use caution when
prepping their eggs.

      The Easter egg and that ubiquitous little Easter hare that defies all the natural laws governing mammals are well known to childish fancy. What child has not discovered on Easter morning a whole basket of beautiful pasque eggs and just missed the sight of the little Easter hare that laid them? He is almost as familiar a household personage as Santa Claus. Long hours have the children watched in the woods for him, only to go home and find they have just missed his visit there, and there are those beautiful eggs he left behind, in pink, pale blue, yellow and all the colors of the rainbow, some of them parti-colored, some painted with roses and some tied with ribbons. Of late years this enterprising little animal has gone far as to leave china eggs filled with bonbons, and that he leaves them there is no more doubt than that Santa Claus comes down the chimney on Christmas Eve, and who is so disloyal as to doubt that?

      There are various ways of preparing Easter eggs that give so much delight to little ones. The most elaborately decorated eggs should be emptied and washed of their contents before they are prepared. This is the most economical as well as the most satisfactory way to do: Pierce a small hole through each end, blow out the contents, wash the shells and leave them for several days to dry. Some eggs shells may be gilded, some silvered and some painted in oils. Simple gifts such as are suitable at Easter time may be conceded under these eggs.

      Plain boiled eggs, such as are served on the Easter breakfast table, may be easily dyed with vegetable dyes, which can be procured at caterers or dealers in confectioner’s supplies. It is not in good taste to make these eggs eaten at the breakfast table especially elaborate. The elaborate eggs are those which are supposed to be found incidentally after breakfast, on Easter morning, and are for the amusement of small children. A dish of pale green, white and yellow eggs at one end of the table or robin’s egg blue and pale yellow and white at the other end gives the breakfast table a festive appearance. It is easy enough to prepare a few eggs in each of these colors to obtain this effect. It is a little difficult to get a good green in eggs. Owning to the quantity of lime in the shells all eggs do not take this natural green color as some others will, and it is better to color eggs a simply as possible than to use any powerful dyes when eating them later.

      It is possible to decorate more ornamental eggs of which the contents have been blown out. Eggs may be prepared weeks before Easter and may be hidden away until the eventful morning. These simple eggshells when decorated in natural colors using roses or forget-me-nots and each strung on a fancy ribbon will last a long time, if taken care of.

      The eggs of nearly all ordinary birds, from the gigantic ostrich, whose shell is firm enough to be set in silver, to the smallest bantam, where at one time represented in many shops at Easter time. These were decorated, to hold various kinds of candies or for ornamental purposes. You will net to be diligent to find decorative eggs like these in antique shops or vintage resale in time for Easter if you live in the United States, for it is nearly impossible to find these mouth-blown, decorated eggs for sale. When my children were young, there was a chocolate shop down the street that sold these but that was highly unusual.

How to blow out an egg from Modernmom

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