My kids love dying Easter eggs. For the past few years we've taken to making mosaic pictures every Easter from the eggshells of the eggs we dye. It's a lot of fun, an easy project for little ones and the results are really pretty. Tutorial below.
Step 1: Peel the eggs
Fairly straight forward, I admit. However, do your best to break the eggshell off in large chunks rather than tons of microscopic bits. You'll need a variety of sizes and shapes for your mosaic so this step is pretty important.
Step 2: Separate the egg membrane from the shell
If you've managed to keep the majority of your eggshells in large chunks/pieces this step will be easier. To keep the eggshells from smelling or possibly growing mold remove the thin membrane-like skin from the inside of the shell so all that is left is the hard outer shell. This is not part of the egg, but the actual shell. This step is tedious but crucial to ensuring your pictures will last for years. We've never had an issue with our mosaics going bad, smelling or discoloring over time and our oldest picture is from 4 years ago.
I run my finger along the inside of the shell, as you can see in the picture to peel off the membrane and use my nails to peel away any stragglers. Make sure you are putting the separated shell pieces in a separate container so you don't mix them up with pieces you haven't separated yet. I normally prepare the eggshells the morning of our project and we have a huge pile ready to use. I keep eggshells from previous years in a small Tupperware container so we can use them anytime.
Step 3: Print out your image. I don't have a picture of this step unfortunately. I normally find a black & white illustration online and just print that. Some years I get fancy and add a title and date like the images below
Step 4: Coat small areas of the image with a thin coating of white glue and begin adding your mosaic pieces.
We work in small sections so the glue doesn't dry out. The whole process goes fairly fast. Just keep filling in sections until your picture is finished.
Tip: as you press down on some of the larger eggshell pieces while gluing them, they'll break. That's perfectly fine, it ends up looking deliberate and just as nice.
Step 5: Admire the finished mosaic and hang it for everyone to see.
I hope a few of you will be inspired to try this fun craft with your kids this Easter. Let me know if you have any questions.
