Sweet Pea is 47 months old.
NOTE: Are you looking for an edible version of this activity that can be used with real eggs? Read my Beautiful EDIBLE Marble Egg post!
From: I love the look of marbled Easter eggs and decided to try our marbled paper technique to create them.
Material:
- Wooden eggs. (We got our wooden ones from Hobby Lobby, but I couldn’t find a link to the exact ones we used. Oriental Trading Company also sells something similar.) [UPDATE: I do NOT recommend eating real eggs that have been dyed with shaving cream and liquid water colors. Eggs shells are permeable! Please read my updated Beautiful EDIBLE Marble Egg post for how to do this with real eggs.]
- Shaving cream.
- 3 or 4 Different colors of liquid water colors (or food coloring).
- Jelly roll pan or disposable baking tray.
- A paintbrush, un-sharpened pencil or something similar to swirl the colors.
- Tongs or a large serving spoon.
- Cookie cooling rack.
- Cookie sheet or something to go under the cooling rack and catch paint drips.
- Paper towels.
- A towel to clean up messes.
- A smock or bib for your tot.
- Sealing Spray (Optional)
Procedure:
- Set your cooling rack on top of your cookie sheet.
- Fill the bottom of the baking tray with shaving cream.
- Sprinkle several drops of each color of liquid water colors on the shaving cream.
- Let your tot use the end of the paintbrush to gently swirl the colors together. Don’t swirl too much or the colors will not be as bright.
- When the colors are swirled, have your tot place an egg in the pan.
- Let your tot roll the egg around until it is entirely coated with colored shaving cream.
- Use the tongs or serving spoon to remove the egg to a cooling rack.
- To color the next eggs, make sure to roll them in an unused section of the swirled water colors. If there is no unused section, add more water colors and swirl them again before dropping in the next egg. If the water colors are too mixed into the shaving cream, they will turn out very dull on your egg. Fresh coloring equals more vibrant eggs.
- Allow the eggs to dry overnight. The shaving cream with partially disolve, leaving an odd shaggy mess.
- Use a paper towel to rub the dried shaving cream from each egg
- Admire your fine marbled eggs. 🙂
- Spray the eggs with a glossy sealing spray to water proof them.
Observations: Sweet Pea loved making these eggs. She especially enjoyed dropping the eggs into the shaving cream mixture. She complained loudly when we were out of eggs.
We had lots of fun with this and I adore the beautiful results.
This activity is highly recommended for anyone who can handle a messy craft.
Notes from the Trenches: These eggs are not colorfast. Since my liquid water colors were “washable”, getting the eggs wet caused the brilliant color to run off of them. I suspect that using food coloring might solve this problem, but I didn’t have any. If you try this with food coloring, please let me know it is colorfast. [UPDATE: I had reports that food coloring rubbed off the eggs too, but Aleacia from Dilly-Dali Art says that spraying the eggs with a glossy sealing spray will make them waterproof. When I bring the eggs out for Easter this year, I will definitely coat them to finish them.
As I mentioned, this was a fairly messy activity. Sweet Pea got a lot of color all over her fingers because she kept forgetting to use the tongs. She would just reach in and try to turn the eggs with her hands. You can see what a lovely shade of purple the tips of her fingers are in the picture below.
If you’ve tried my method, please leave a comment letting me know how it turned out!
Rating: 2 Stars * (Fun, Easy)
Carnivals: This post is linked up It’s Playtime at hands on : as we grow.
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I will be doing this with my toddler art group, thank you so much for posting!
And I’ll try it with the food coloring and let you know how it turns out 🙂
This looks like a fun project. I’ve linked up to your post here on my weekly favorites: http://play2grow.blogspot.com/2011/04/weekly-favorites-for-april-17-2011.html
We made these eggs!
So much fun and so beautiful, not to mention messy!
We used the food coloring and the color rubbed off with water as well, they looked similar to the picture you posted so I gently rubbed them with my finger and sprayed them to seal the color
Thanks for the wonderful idea!
http://dillydaliart.blogspot.com/2011/04/with-art-group-shaving-cream-eggs.html
Thank you for letting me know about the food coloring!
I loved this idea so much I’ve shared it on my weekly posting, Do Something!
Thanks for the idea!
Rachele @ Messy Kids
Just wondering why you used wooden eggs as opposed to real hard boiled ones? I am going to try this today with my kids. Planning to use food coloring in the shaving cream and dipping the eggs in vinegar(apple cider vinegar to be exact- out of the traditional white) before rolling them in shaving cream. I will let you know how it turns out. I love marbling paper this way and have used the technique many times in my classes, thanks for sharing this idea of using it for egg dyeing!
Turned out really well! The vinegar dip really sealed in the color and I was able to rinse off the shaving cream after about 15 minutes instead of overnight.
I am a kindergarten teacher and would love to do the egg coloring with vinegar & shaving cream! Would you consider emailing me the steps? Do you think I could do this project with 20 five year olds? 🙂
Thank you for taking the time to share your creativity!
Kelly
kberlick@sbcglobal.net
Thanks for taking the time to leave a comment! You said that you want me to email you steps for doing the activity with vinegar and shaving cream, but I am not exactly sure what you are looking for. I didn’t use any vinegar when we created our eggs and everything we did do is listed in the post. I am so sorry that I can’t figure out what you want. Please try to explain it to me again and I’ll try to help you.
You also asked if I thought that the project could be done with 20 5-year olds. Well, it is really really messy. I think it could be done, but there will be coloring all over them and everything they are wearing. I know that Dilly Dally Art did them with at least several children, but I don’t know exactly how many: http://www.dillydaliart.com/2011/04/with-art-group-shaving-cream-eggs.html Good Luck! lol.
I think she was looking for a response from Julie since that’s who she replied to…
Too late now for this year, but follow the same instructions as above using hard boiled eggs and food colouring, but before rolling the eggs in the shaving cream dip them in vinegar. Let them sit for 15-20 min then rinse the shaving cream off.
To do it with your class you’d probably want a few parent helpers that day 🙂
Ahh. I see my mistake. I just get comments in my inbox so I couldn’t tell that she was asking someone else. Sorry. 🙂
@Kelly – I did something similar to this with my kinder students last year, but with tempera paint (did not work so well as the eggs did not have enough time to dry and the paint ended up smearing around), but we did it in small-sized, but deep, box lids and pulled only a few kiddos at a time. I think I’ll probably try with the vinegar, shaving cream and food coloring this year, but definitely still just a small amount of kids at a time. Also, I did notice that the smaller the container, the quicker they were done. The bigger the container, the more time they kind of wasted just rolling back and forth trying to get it all covered.
I would only do it with my Kindergarten class with a parent helper or teaching assistant if I were you. Any student teachers around? LOL?
This topped our favorite Easter egg dying techniques this year! Thanks for the idea. I posted about them, as well as a few other activities.
http://www.cowsgomooandducksgoquack.blogspot.com
Big fan here!
Gianne
Looks fun to me!! Hopefully, one day my E will like to get messy!
Kerri
Will it work on glass?
Hmm… I don’t think the liquid water color would work on glass, but another type of paint might.
I was wondering if using Cool Whip could be used instead of shaving cream, so hard boiled eggs could still be eaten?
What an interesting idea. I love it! I think I’ll try using cool whip and food coloring on regular eggs this year and see what happens!
Dear Vicki,
thank you for asking.
yes, the hard boiled eggs should still can be eaten 😀
and i am not sure if i use shaving cream, it can still be eaten.
i will try with whip cream, food coloring, apple vinegar this Easter 🙂
Thank you for the best idea ever Shannon, love it…
Glad you like it!
Thank you Vicki!! I was reading threw all the comments hopping that some1 had the same question I had about the eggs being edible after using the shaving cream!!! My family uses the eggs for easter dinner and my kids are gettin bored with the same old egg dying thing every year so I been looking for new way to have fun with dying and came across this idea. Thank you Shannon for the basic idea. I will also be tring the whip cream way and see if it works as well.
This is a cute and fun idea. I think I’m going to try the technique to make marbled paper weights with my nieces. I’ll be using wood balls instead of eggs though.
Can we do this to real hard boiled eggs? Just making sure be cause it said wooden eggs. Ha! Thanks
I am not sure, but I think other people have had success with real eggs. I am about to try it again with real eggs and will write a post about my results it in a couple of weeks.
How neat! Are these eggs still eatable?
I used wooden eggs so it wasn’t an issue, but just to be on the safe side, I don’t think I eat eggs that I had rolled in shaving cream.
I’m the Editorial Assistant for Fun Family Crafts and I wanted to let you know that we have featured your project! You can see it here:
http://funfamilycrafts.com/marbled-eggs/
If you have other kid friendly crafts, we’d love it if you would submit them. If you would like to display a featured button on your site, you can grab one from the right side bar of your post above. Thanks for a wonderful project idea!
Does anyone know if the shaving cream makes the eggs toxic if they are eaten?
I do not know for sure, but I would not recommend eating them.
Shannon ,
Did you try with real eggs and cool whip?
Kathy
Yes. I will put a post out about it this week!
i cant see why you couldnt eat the hard boiled eggs, the shaving cream doesnt go on the inside of the egg….but as cheap as eggs are i dont think it matters that much, just hard boil another dozen or so for eating……i am going to do this tomorrow with my 4 yr old granddaughter! ty for the great idea
I know that the egg shells are permeable to dye (since the white inside usually gets colored when I dye an Easter egg)(, so I think they are probably also permeable to the shaving cream. I wouldn’t want to advocate that anyone eat something that isn’t a food item.
made these eggs with my grand-daughter. She thought this was great fun
Cute idea. I am a grandma that has been using whitening toothpaste for years to get the food coloring dye off of my hands and fingers. Heloise even published my “hint” some years ago. 😉
PS…make sure it’s WHITENING toothpaste!!!
Thanks for the tip! I will try it!
Hi Shannon,
I work at an FRC (Family Resource Center) and have an after school program for children, what a wonderful idea this was. I’m just curious if the cool whip/food coloring worked? I really want to do this as one of our projects next week with the kids but don’t want to send them home with eggs dipped in shaving creme if it isn’t edible.
The whipped cream worked! See the post detailing my results here: http://totschool.shannons.org/edible-marbled-easter-eggs/
I am in college for Early Childhood and I plan to do this with Pre-schoolers and im so excited. The only question I have is do you have to dip them in Vinegar right before putting them in the shaving cream or can I put them in vinegar the night before? will it have the same effect?
When I used cool whip, I dipped them in vinegar right before putting them into it. I think I would try to do it right before, but it might work if you did it ahead of time. I think the more the eggs are handled, the less the dye sticks to them. See more info here: http://totschool.shannons.org/edible-marbled-easter-eggs/
Think this decorating technique would work on fabric like muslin material? Would be a nice watercolor effect for quilting.
Yes, you might be able to use shaving cream with fabric dye spread on top. Interesting idea!
I used kool aid instead of food coloring. It worked great and edible. Mix one packet of kool aid with one tblsp water then drop onto whipped cream. U can wipe off or rinse the eggs after one hour because the citric acid in the koolaid stains the eggs fabulously! Use different flavors koolaid for different Colorado.
Oh, Kool Aid is an interesting idea! We did this with cool whip instead of shaving cream this year: http://totschool.shannons.org/edible-marbled-easter-eggs
Thank you for sharing this with us! I foolishly missed that you did this with wooden eggs and ended up doing them with normal eggs. They are beautiful though. Next time we are using wooden eggs though!
http://www.littlecrunchy.com/2013/03/a-different-way-to-dye-easter-eggs.html
Thanks for stopping by and commenting Shannon. Can I ask how you found my post before I shared it here with you?
My post always listed wooden eggs under materials, although when I read your post I added the snipit about “although others have had mixed results.” lol.
After I rubbed the eggs clean, they (both wooden/shaving cream and real/coolwhip) were not sticky at all, so I think the problem was probably the type of dye you used.
(P.S. The way I found your post was because I got a “pingback” from your blog post. When you posted the link to my site, I am guessing that you allowed pingbacks so your site notified my site that there was a link to it. More info: http://wordpress.org/support/topic/what-is-pingback-or-ping-for)
I did the egg thing with ceramic eggs and “pearlized” craft paint then sealed them. They are perfect and look just like the real thing!!!!
So glad that this worked for you. I love the idea of using “pearlized” craft paint. I bet it is beautiful. 🙂
Cool Aid is a great idea.I used meringue instead of shaving cream and candy food coloring which didn’t cause the bright color to run off of the eggs. It worked great and edible.
3/4 cup sugar
3/4 cup water
1/4 cup egg white powder
Directions:
1
Blend 1/4 cup sugar and egg white powder in a mixer bowl.
2
Add water and mix on low-medium speed 3-5 minutes until smooth.
3
Scrape bowl.
4
Beat on high speed, gradually adding remaining sugar and vanilla.
5
Scrape bowl.
6
Beat until meringue is stiff and shiny but NOT DRY
This year we made an edible version using cool whip and I blogged about it here: http://totschool.shannons.org/edible-marbled-easter-eggs/
Next time I will definitely try the candy food coloring though. Thanks for your ideas! I think I’m going to have to put all these tips together and create yet another experiment for next year. 🙂
I did this with my class of autistic children and they loved it. For brighter colors using neon food coloring is good. I also dipped the boiled eggs in vinegar let them dry before rolling in shaving cream- it kept the colors bright without it fading or washing off.
We just made these today and it worked great! We used cool-whip and hard boiled eggs. Our two year old’s loved it and they dried quite quickly. Thanks for the inspiration.
I tried this this year with my kids, they turned out so pretty. Was it just my imagination or did the shaving cream make the eggs inside taste funny, kind of like shaving cream.
I do NOT recommend eating the shaving cream eggs. We used wooden eggs. If you are interested in using real eggs, please read my post about how to create EDIBLE marbled eggs: http://totschool.shannons.org/edible-marbled-easter-eggs/
I just did this with my pre-k class (4-5 year olds). There were 27 students and 2 teachers.
Each child had their own tray and were able to pick different colors to swirl.
We used food coloring and shaving cream only. It worked great and for the
most part it wasn’t to messy!
Fantastic! I’m glad it wasn’t too messy for you!
I tried these marbled eggs with my toddlers yesterday, and they were a huge hit. I used real eggs, dipped them in vinegar and once they were wiped off, I painted them with a clear glitter glaze… they were beautiful! Even the other teachers were asking me how I did it so that they could do it at home with their children! Thanks for this! Loved it!
Where did you get the clear glitter glaze?
This worked amazing!! My boys had such a blast but we did learn with one how vital it was to dunk in vinegar first! oh and a little oxyclean in warm water after then wash hands normal and they are no longer all sorts of colors!!
I’m glad you liked it. What happened without the vinegar? Were the eggs just pale or did it not work at all?
We soaked the boiled eggs in Vinegar while we were rolling one. My nephew loved it! He used a wooden spoon to move the egg around, it was easier for him than the tongs. He didn’t wan’t to dye the eggs until he saw how easy it was. He did not want to stop dying them. Thanks so much for the post!!
You’re welcome!
What kinda spray seal ?
Try this kind. You should be able to find it at a craft store.
I’m featuring your beautiful idea on The Crafty Crow soon!
Thank you Cassi!!
I used the same steps, besides the eggs! I used the plastic eeaster eggs. It worked well too 🙂
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