Dying eggs without dye/vinegar

[leighi123]

My ds is allergic to food dyes (and easter egg dyes), AND vinegar. I still want him to dye some eggs!

Any ideas on how to do it?

[katelove]

Strongly brewed tea/coffee. Spinach juice. Raspberry juice. Pomegranate juice. Would any of those be ok for his allergies?

[KristyDi]

I'm assuming by food dyes you mean like the food coloring you can by in the baking asile of the grocery store.


I experimented last year w/ natural dyes from food. Onion skins boiled in water give a nice redish orange color, kinda brick like. Blue cabbage gave a beautiful robin's egg blue. Turmeric gave a nice golden yellow.

The egg in DD's hand was dyed w/ Turmeric.

The one on the ground was dyed w/ lots of onion skins that had been boiled for a while.

Strangely I don't have a pic of the red cabbage dyed one. It was my favorite.

You can google for more ideas.

[laohaire]

Beets, as well.

[MissMommyNiceNice]

Well, I guess from the above post, you can do onion skins w/o vinegar! That's what I was going to suggest. One stand at my farmers' market sells them by the bag about this time of year. If you're not going to use vingegar, I'd probably recommend two bags.

[Rhiannon Feimorgan]

Grape juice concentrate will give you a lavender colour.


I'm not sure if he would have a reaction to this but we sometimes decorate eggs with tissue paper.

Use the kind of tissue paper that does NOT say that it won't bleed. Tear off small pieces of tissue in various colours and wrap them around the egg. Then use a spray bottle to wet the tissue. The dye from the tissue will bleed and stain the egg. Once the tissue is dry you can remove it. It makes a nice tie dye effect. It's also not very messy which is a bonus.

[DeerMother]

http://tipnut.com/how-to-make-chinese-tea-eggs/

[moss]

i like painting wooden eggs with ds. They keep well from year to year and make cute momento's. he's on feingold, so we're uber careful with dyes, etc. I'm a big fan of silicone cream or non-latex gloves to protect his skin from accidental exposure while he's painting

http://www.feingoldmemberinfo.com/ma...tycrafter.html
this has some cute instructions for yarn wrapped eggs

[lonegirl]

Why not use non-toxic paint or markers? That is what I have done in the past.

[Shellie]

http://www.google.com/search?q=natur...ient=firefox-a

I googled and am really excited over some of those sites! I think I'm doing it naturally this year!!

[ErinYay]

I want to try the silk necktie method this year!

http://blog.al.com/bargain-mom/2009/...ject_dont.html

I'm going to get a bunch at the thrift store- I'll let you know how it goes!

OP- this method does use vinegar, though. Sorry!

[leighi123]

Thanks for all of the ideas! I think we will be able to do most of the food ones.. I know he is ok with beets (as long as its a certian kind), spinach, and tumeric, and if we can find blue cabage that would be fun too!

The paint/markers, we do use them, but I have to be super careful that he washes his hands really well and doesnt get it on his face/mouth... its a pain to monitor, but he ends up in an awful rash hardly touching it. With the eggs I'd suspect that it would be harder to keep off of him b/c of the akward shape for little hands to try and hold onto while coloring.... but we might do some paper eggs for decoration!

The tissue paper and the neck tie ones sound really cool, but I dont think either would work for him. Poor kid is allergic to EVERYTHING.


Last year before we found out about some of his allergy issues:
http://i169.photobucket.com/albums/u...9/DSC01206.jpg
http://i169.photobucket.com/albums/u...9/DSC01208.jpg
http://i169.photobucket.com/albums/u...9/DSC01207.jpg
http://i169.photobucket.com/albums/u...9/DSC01210.jpg
http://i169.photobucket.com/albums/u...9/DSC01211.jpg
http://i169.photobucket.com/albums/u...9/DSC01122.jpg

I can't believe he was actually soaking in dye back then! (we also put him in oatmeal baths for his rashes, come to find out he is allergic to oats!) Funny looking at these pics too... he still wears the clothes in these pics and they fit him the same, he hasnt grown in a year!

[JessicaS]

He is too adorable

[JessicaS]

Wouldn't citric acid work instead of vinegar? Does he have issues with that?

[leighi123]

Originally Posted by abimommy

He is too adorable

Thank you!


I dunno about citric acid...I dont know that he has ever had it. Maybe lemon juice would work though? He is fine with lemons! I'll have to do some experimenting to see what comes out!

[JessicaS]

Citric acid is practically in everything, a lot of vitamins have it.


Mother Earth News this month has an article about natural dyes. It has quite a lot in it