With school holidays and Easter approaching, it’s time to get into some fun Easter crafts with your kids. I used to hand paint Easter eggs with my children when they were little, so I thought it would be fun to show you some of the clever ways that you can decorate your Easter eggs this year.

Who’s up for some Easter egg decorating this year? It’s been a long time since my kids and I painted Easter eggs, but they used to love it and always enjoyed it. Being Czech, it’s tradition to paint real eggs, thread them with ribbon and hang them up on some kind of tree. The image below is one of my eggs that I did several years ago with a technique that my grandmother taught me. As you can see, I’m not that good at hand painting, but it was always fun to try. All you need are some acrylic paints, fine paintbrushes and the shells of the eggs. Then you can go for it and let your imagination take over.

The way my grandmother taught me, was to make a tiny hole at the top and bottom of the egg, blow the egg white and yolk out, let the egg shell dry and then paint away. Here’s a video on how Martha Stewart blows out the eggs to help you out. You can create some beautiful designs with this technique, and if you’re careful enough, you can store them in a normal egg carton and use them year after year. Here’s some more designs I did with some ribbon, the egg blowing technique, acrylic paints and paint brushes. Not a bad job if I do say so myself! Best thing about this technique is that if you blow the eggs out when you’re cooking a quiche, the eggs don’t go to waste either.

Some More Ways To Decorate Your Easter Eggs

There are other fun ways to decorate your Easter eggs without having the need to blow the yolk and whites out. I’ve used most of these techniques over the years, so I know that they work well. You can boil the eggs first and decorate them hard boiled, so that you can eat them over the Easter weekend with family and friends. It’s also a great way to get your kids excited about eating real eggs, rather than only chocolate eggs. Here’s some fun ways that you can decorate your eggs this year.

1. USE WHIPPED CREAM TO COLOUR YOUR EASTER EGGS

This is a great Easter egg decorating idea. I particularly like this whipped cream technique, because you can still eat the eggs. Create some beautiful marble effects on the shells of the eggs by boiling the eggs and letting them cool. Then add a thick layer of whipped cream onto a plate, squeeze different coloured food colouring on top of the cream in zig zag patterns and roll your boiled eggs over the surface of the cream and colouring. Then just let the eggs fully dry and rub off any cream left on the eggs. Visit Better Homes and Gardens for their tutorial.

Photo credit: Better Homes and Gardens

2. DOILY STENCILLING ON YOUR EASTER EGGS

Did you know that you can actually use paper doilies to stencil some beautiful patterns onto your Easter eggs? This is such a sweet way to decorate, because you will achieve some timeless patterns that will look like old fashioned lace. It might look difficult, but it’s quite simple to do. By cutting some of the patterns out and then painting over them onto your hard boiled eggs, you will get some really pretty patterns. Visit Urban Comfort for the full tutorial.

Photo credit: Urban Comfort

3. MARBLE INDIGO EASTER EGGS

I really love the way these denim coloured marble Easter eggs turned out. You can achieve this great look by using different coloured nail polish to create a marbled effect on your hard boiled eggs. Don’t they look fabulous? I would however, recommend for you to not eat these and only use them as display eggs over the Easter weekend. Nail polish is toxic and even though the shell protects the egg, I wouldn’t risk it. You can find the full tutorial at Alice & Lois.

Photo credit: Alice and Lois

4. TRADITIONALLY DECORATED EASTER EGGS WITH STRAW

Being Czech, I grew up with these beautifully decorated eggs because my grandmother used to do them every year. The Czechs and Slovaks take a lot of pride in their traditions, and straw decorated Easter eggs is one of them. Each year, the local ladies collect barley straw to dry out, and after painting the eggs one particular colour, they intricately stick the straw onto the eggs to create beautiful patterns. It is a tricky and time consuming way to do it, but the end results are so beautiful, that it’s worth the effort. Plus, your imagination can go crazy. Check out Almost Bananas on how it’s done and see if you’re game enough to give it a go.

Photo  credit: Almost Bananas

5. EASTER BUNNY DECORATED EASTER EGGS

Your kids will love creating these gorgeous Bunny Easter eggs with you. They’re so sweet and would look great in a little basket on the table on Easter Sunday when everyone sits down for breakfast. You can use food colouring to dye the bottom of the eggs, so that they’re safe to eat too! The rest of the decorating is done with crayon, so as long as you use a non toxic brand, everyone can enjoy them at Easter time. Visit Bitte for the full tutorial.

Photo credit: Bitte

6. PAINT EASTER EGGS WITH WATERCOLOUR

Try your hand at using watercolours to paint your Easter eggs. You don’t even need to be an expert painter, because as long as you use some pretty colours, you can keep the design as simple or as technical as you like. Craftberry Bush has a lovely flower tutorial that you can try. Look how beautiful her eggs turned out by simply painting some pretty flowers on the eggs. You could even try gluing some real pressed flowers onto the eggs in certain spots if you feel like you can’t completely paint them.

Photocredit: Craftberry Bush

7. TEMPORARY TATTOO DECORATED EASTER EGGS

Who would have thought that you could use temporary tattoos to decorate your Easter Eggs right, but apparently you can and they look good too. I found this brilliant idea on The Crafted Life, and I must say that the end results are so lovely and sweet, that your kids will love decorating like this. The best part is that you can be as creative as you want because you can get so many different temporary tattoos these days, that you will be able to achieve all sorts of themes on your eggs.

Photo credit: The Crafted Life

9. USING NATURAL DYES TO COLOUR YOUR EASTER EGGS

Did you know that you can actually dye your Easter Eggs by using certain foods and natural products? My grandmother used to boil the eggs in onion skins, which would then colour the eggs a natural brown or a purple when using red onion skins. That’s one way to do it, but check out Country Living’s tutorial on how you can achieve lots of different colours with this simple technique. You can then leave the eggs as is, or use them as your coloured canvas to continue decorating with any of the techniques I’ve listed.

Photo credit: Country Living

9. NATURALLY DYED BOTANICAL EASTER EGGS

Using this technique to dye your Easter Eggs with is a wonderful way to achieve some pretty patterns on your hard boiled eggs. As a child, my mother and I used a lot of flowers and plants to achieve botanical patterns like these ones on our hard boiled eggs. Bigs Sis Lil Sis has a nice tutorial for you to follow if you want to try this technique out for yourself. The kids will love this one because it’s always a surprise to see how the eggs will look once you take the flowers off after boiling.

Photo credit: Big Sis Lil Sis

10. DECOUPAGE EASTER EGGS

Good old fashioned decoupage decorating. It’s a technique that’s been used for centuries on furniture, so why not use it on your Easter eggs! With this technique, you can achieve anything you want really, because you can cut out images from magazines, old, unused children’s books, even flyers that get dropped into your mail box and usually end up being thrown away. The possibilities are endless. Check out Honestly Yum’s tutorial on the best way to do it.

Photo credit: Honestly Yum

11. SILK DYED EASTER EGGS

I wonder who discovered the fact that you can use silk coloured material to dye your Easter eggs with? I wish I could thank them because this technique really works! I know this because I have tried this before and it works a treat, with the end results being absolutely gorgeous. Check out the tutorial on how to do it at Our Best Bites. It’s such a clever way to create some really beautiful Easter eggs this year. Any silk material will work, so don’t go cutting dad’s best ties up for this one, unless he doesn’t need them anymore.

Photo credit: Handimania

12. HAND PAINTED BOTANICAL EASTER EGGS

Wow, aren’t these just beautiful! I love hand painting my Easter eggs, but these ones from The House That Lars Built are just divine. I love the colour on the black background. The artist is definitely a wonderful painter and your eggs might not turn out as good as this, but I don’t think it really matters. You don’t have to be an artist to create something so beautiful, you just have to give it a go. I would recommend blowing the yolks and whites out of the eggs for this technique so that you can save them and reuse them as an Easter decoration year after year. I would hate to have to throw these out after such hard work has been put into them.

Photo credit: The House That Lars Built

If you have a fun and effective way that you decorate your Easter eggs, let me know in the comment section below.