Pysansky Eggs

My friend Carolyn invited me to her church's Pysansky egg workshop. She is a member of an Eastern Orthodox church. One of her church friends, Tanya, is from the Ukraine and offers this workshop every spring and it was a real treat. I was very overwhelmed when I saw all the elaborate patterns and designs you could do. Once Carolyn and Tanya walked me through step by step it was quite fun. It was a very relaxing day with a delicious lunch. Eastern Orthodox have a pretty strict Lenten fast, with the most strict of them fasting from all animal products including meat, dairy and eggs. So there were lots of soups, fruits and veggies.

You start with a white egg that has been blown out and cleaned. You use a special tool to melt beeswax and draw the parts of your egg that you want to stay white (you can draw with a pencil first). Then you dye your egg beginning with the lightest color. On the egg above I started with the yellow dye. Then you use your wax again to color all the areas you want to remain yellow and dye again. The next dye was orange. For the green dots you just use a qtip instead of dipping the whole egg. When you've done your last color you remove all the wax (by heating the egg in a low temp oven) and you get this beautiful design. It really was just amazing that it looks so complex was just step by step.

It reminds me of the scripture in Isaiah 28: precept must be upon precept, precept upon precept, line upon line, line upon line, a little here, a little there. Our life looks complex and messy now, He dunks and dips us into all sorts of things. But we are being refined and in the end when all the mess is wiped away we will be see what He had in mind all along, a beautiful and elaborate creation.


This egg was dipped just once in a single color, I liked the simplicity of it.