Volcano Easter Egg Experiment

Easter Egg Decorating Ideas ~ Volcano Egg Dyeing

Late one night (I think my best ideas come after midnight), I was trying to figure out what to do with our left over egg dye. They looked so pretty lined up in mason jars, and I could not just throw them out. Since my kids LOVE science experiments and decorating eggs, I decided to combine the 2. Volcano Easter Eggs were a huge hit and one of my best Easter egg decorating ideas yet!

Mad Scientist Egg Dyeing ~ Volcano easter egg experiment

Take egg dyeing to the next level and turn it into a science experiment! I promise you, your kids will LOVE it!

Volcano Egg Dyeing Instructions:

Mix a ratio of about 2 T of baking soda to every 1 T of egg dye. Stir to form a wet paste. If the color does not seem bright enough add a few drops of food coloring.

Most egg dye uses a few tablespoons of vinegar. So there will be a small reaction when the dye was added to the baking soda. Don’t worry, it won’t effect the experiment!

You could try food coloring instead of egg dye, but that would defeat the purpose of using up my leftover egg dye;)

Since I knew this experiment had the potential to be crazy messy we took it outside to the patio. We used paint brushes to paint the thick paste onto our eggs. Yep, this was just as much fun for the adults as it was for the kids!

The thicker the paste that was painted onto the egg, the better the reaction.

The kids could not wait to drop our baking soda covered eggs into vinegar. The kids have played with baking soda and vinegar before and always love to watch the fizzy reaction. They were really excited to see how it would help to color their eggs.

I love these excited little faces! Oh to have the simple joy of kids!

Everyone LOVED the whole process of coloring these little Volcano Easter eggs. This might not be as relaxing as painting eggs the traditional way, but it was tons of fun. Since we were outside, there was very little mess to clean up! This is defiantly something that we will be repeating again next year. I hope your family enjoys this little experiment as much as we did. Happy Easter!

Check out how beautiful this egg turned out, it almost looks tie dyed.

Looking for more fun ways to Dye your Easter eggs? Check out our:

Sharpie Tie Dye Easter Eggs

Melted Crayon Easter Eggs

Kool-aid Easter Eggs

Naturally Dyed Easter Eggs

Volcano Egg Dyeing

Here is a link to a fun list of great experiments that my kids love.

Sprouting Seed Activity

Spring is right around the corner, and I am SO excited! There is something about new life sprouting up that makes me really happy. While visiting my parents, they engaged the kids in a simple sprouting seed activity. My mom loves to garden, so this was the perfect project to take on while visiting her.

I love her seed stash. She enjoys saving seeds and has a number of different varieties of seeds she has collected over the years.

We created simple mini greenhouses with recycled tins, damp paper towels and a plastic bag. Lay a damp paper towel on the bottom of your container and gently “plant” your seeds. We planted a variety of seeds in each container so we carefully mapped out where each seed was to refer to later. Everyone plants in their PJ’s right:)

Once everything was planted in our greenhouses, we each made predictions on which seed would be the first to sprout. It was fun listening to the kids make predictions. Two of the kids were convinced that the Oak Trees would be first:)

We were amazed that by the next evening the cucumbers, broccoli and scarlet runner beans had already started sprouting. Who knew that it could happen that quickly! The kids loved peeking in to see what was happening to the seeds. The seeds that had not sprouted were starting to swell getting ready to sprout. We talked about germination and each type of seed will have a different germination period.

A few days later, the trays were exploded with sprouted seeds and plants. We were all intrigued by the roots, they were everywhere. It was also fun to see the leaves. No soil, and they still were growing.

I’m sure the plants would not last long growing like this, but it was a great teaching moment to show the kids how plants roots grow. We ended up having to fly home before we could plant the seeds in soil, so we left that job up to mom. Thanks for the fun project mom, the kids loved it! Now I need to get my seeds started, maybe after Easter.

Here is a link to a fun list of great experiments that my kids love.

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Painting with Jelly Beans

Easter Activity for Kids ~ Painting with Jelly Beans

Jelly beans are everywhere this time of year, but have you ever read the label? Yikes! So instead of consuming these little guys we decided to paint with them. Don’t get me wrong, I’m sure my kiddos will get their fill of these sugary little guys on Easter;) However, it is always fun to find another use for them! Check out this simple Painting with Jelly Beans Activity.

Here is another simple activity that requires little or no set up. Love that!

Painting with Jelly Beans:

Jelly Beans ~ Left over Easter or Halloween candy works great too.
Spray bottle filled with water
Watercolor Paper or other thick paper that can withstand getting soaked.
Tray ~ to contain the drips.

Simply place you paper on the tray. We chose to cut ours into festive egg shapes, but you can skip this step.

Have the kids arrange their Jelly Beans on the paper and spray way! Seriously there is no wrong way to do it.

As the jelly beans started “melting” they left behind puddles of color. The kids enjoyed watching the colorful puddles appear and they giggled at their sticky fingers. More spray was used to help the jelly beans melt faster.

It was fun watching the kids figure out what method of “painting” worked best. They decided that if they left the beans in one place for a while, it created a bright puddle of color. This might not be the most amazing piece of artwork, but the process is a fun one.

I love encouraging kids (and adults) to think outside the box. The next time you open your cupboard, think art instead of supper (after you family is happily fed of course). You might be surprised with what you find!

For more unique painting ideas, check out our:

Painting with Licorice

Candy Painting

Compass Painting

Double Brush Painting

Bobble Head Chicks

Recycled crafts for kids ~ Egg Carton Chicks

I had the pleasure of discovering Laura’s creative blog over at Chipman’s Corner Preschool. She is passionate about teaching and is excited to share her fun ideas with all of us. I love these adorable Bobble Head Chicks she made. Simple recycled crafts for kids that are perfect for Easter.

She has tons of creative ideas for your little one. There are crafts for almost any season or topic that you can think of. Check our her latest post on how to make these fun bobble head chicks. I love that they are made from recycled egg cartons.

They are adorable! I love that Laura also created a cute nest for these little guys to live in. Hop on over to her blog for a full set a instructions and more pictures.

Hope you have as much fun peeking around her blog as I did. I still have more exploring to do, but here are a few of my favorite projects…check out this great DIY kite and I can’t wait to make these cool Shooting Space Ships. We all love sweet comments, so please leave Laura a note of encouragement. There is nothing better than having your inbox filled with comments.

For more Easter crafts for kids, check out our:

Paper Plate Sheep

Egg Carton Cross

Easter Borax Crystals

Funny Bunny Faces Game

Paper Chicks for cutting practice

Natural Egg Dye

Natural Dyed Easter Eggs

Dyeing Easter eggs is one of our favorite Easter traditions. Recently, I have been in awe of all these beautiful natural dyed Easter eggs all over Pinterest. This is something that I have been wanting to try it for a few years, but for one reason or another it has not happened until now.

How to make Natural Egg Dye

After reading a few posts on which combinations of veggies and fruits created the best colors, we stated chopping. We chose to use blueberries, spinach and beets.

We placed our eggs in boiling water, vegetables and vinegar, and boiled for 30 minutes.

Most of the posts I read, strained the veggies from the dye. I decided to skip that step and place my eggs in along with all the chopped up veggies. I’m not sure if that was where this little project went wrong or if it was something else…but check out these muted colors.

The front 2 eggs were dyed in blueberries. The left 2 eggs in spinach and the back 4 eggs in beets. I was expecting bright beautiful eggs, however we ended up with muted and dull colors. Weird.

The kids claimed the eggs looked like potatoes, bummer. Totally not the look I was going for. I guess I should keep trying. Anyone else tried natural dyed easter eggs with good results?

For more fun ways to dye Easter eggs, check out our: