Let us show you How to Dye Easter Eggs the easy way! Coloring Easter eggs has always been a favorite activity at my house and this Easter egg dye recipe is super simple and doesn’t use boiling water so it’s safe around young kids. This Easter egg coloring method is so easy, yet it’s a super effective way to dye or decorate Easter eggs for your Easter egg hunt.
Easiest Way to Safely Dye Easter Eggs
There are so many different Easter egg dying methods you can find online, but this one is super easy and safe especially if you are coloring Easter eggs with kids.
Related: No mess Eggmazing Egg Decorator and Make Natural Food Coloring + Ideas)
The first step in any Easter egg dying method is always to boil your eggs. This can be done in advance and will make your Easter egg dying time less stressful if you are starting with room temperature boiled eggs.
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Preparing Boiled Eggs for Dyeing
How to Choose the Best Eggs for Dyeing when Coloring Eggs
White eggs will show the most brilliant colors so if you are planning on using primary colors to dye eggs, then starting out with white eggs will give you the brightest color potential. If you are looking for a more soft and natural egg coloring, then using other color eggs can make that happen in a beautiful and sometimes unpredictable way.
Supplies Needed to Boil Eggs for Dyeing
- Eggs
- Water
- Stove top pan large enough to accommodate the number of eggs you are boiling
How to Boil Eggs for Dyeing
Step 1
Boiling eggs is really easy: just add eggs to a pot and fill with water until water reaches a point about two inches above the top of the eggs.
Step 2
Once the water begins to form bubbles at the bottom of the pan, set the timer for 10 minutes. The goal is to keep the water boiling during that 10 minute period, but it doesn’t have to be a violent boil! In fact, if it is a really rolling boil, it can push the eggs into each other causing cracking.
Step 3
Watch the boiling and turn it to medium or medium high to keep the boiling light to moderate.
Step 4
Turn off heat and transfer to cold water. Set on a towel to dry and cool – I like to use a slotted spoon to remove eggs from the water because even though the water is cool, the eggs still may be warm.
Note: Older eggs tend to peel better than super fresh eggs, so keep that in mind for after your Easter egg hunt.
Step 5
Once the eggs are cool enough to handle, you can start dyeing the eggs. If you prepare the eggs ahead of time, store overnight in the fridge and then pull them out of the fridge 30 minutes to ahead of time so they can be less cold and more room temperature.
How to Dye Easter Eggs
Now that we have eggs, it is time to color our Easter eggs! Coloring eggs is my favorite part!
Supplies needed for Dyeing Easter Eggs
Instructions for Preparing Easter Egg Dye for Egg Coloring
- The first thing you want to do, is decide how many different colors you want to dye your eggs. For instance, if you want to dye eggs red, purple, yellow, green, and blue, then you will need 5 small bowls.
- Next, in each small bowl you will want to add vinegar to water at a 1:3 ratio. So, for every 1/3 cup of vinegar, you are going to add 2/3 cup of water. There is no need to boil your water. That is why I love this Easter egg dye recipe so much! One less thing to do, and I don’t have to worry about my kid getting burned by hot water.
- Now it is time to add liquid food dye to the vinegar and water mixture. Most of the packages of food dye will have instructions on the back that tell you how many drops of each color you will need to dye eggs (see below for our suggestions).
- Give it a quick stir.
Easter Egg Coloring Basic Easter Egg Dye Color Combinations
- Red: 16 drops
- Blue: 20 drops
- Yellow: 20 drops
- Orange: 12 drops yellow and 6 drops red
- Teal: 14 drops blue and 4 drops green
- Purple: 15 drops red and 5 drops blue
- Green: 16 drops
Directions for Dyeing Easter Eggs
- Place the boiled egg in the dye mixture and allow it to sit for a few minutes. The longer you allow it to set, the deeper the color will dye the egg.
- You can use a spoon to turn your egg as needed and move the egg in/out of bowls of color dye.
- Allow to drain on paper towels or an old kitchen towel.
Now it’s time to have your Easter egg hunt with homemade dyed Easter eggs!
Prep Time
10 minutes
Active Time
10 minutes
Total Time
20 minutes
Difficulty
Medium
Estimated Cost
$5
Materials
- White vinegar
- Water
- Liquid food dye
- 12 or so boiled eggs (do NOT peel)
Tools
- Small bowls or mason jars
- Spoons
- Paper towels or old kitchen towel to set eggs on to dry
Instructions
- Choose the number of colors you want to use for your Easter egg dying.
- Make a bowl for each color by adding vinegar to water in a 1:3 ratio of vinegar to total. So, if you have 1/3rd cup of vinegar, you are going to add 2/3rd cup of water for a total of 1 cup of liquid.
- Add liquid food dye to the vinegar and water mixture.
- Stir
- Add hard boiled eggs to the dye mixture and let set until desired color.
- Use a spoon to turn if necessary.
- Drain on paper towels.
- Host an Easter egg hunt!
More Egg Coloring & Decorating Ideas
While it is fun to simply add colors in various amounts of intensity and depths, here are some easy ways to color Easter eggs with a little more creativity and fun…
1. Make Tie Dye Eggs with Your Egg Coloring
Take rubber bands and wrap them around your egg. We found that the thicker bands worked better. You can then either dip the eggs into the dye whole, or you can use a medicine dropper to put the dye onto specific sections you are interested in dying (making an almost stained glass effect). The result of dipping the whole egg are some stripes which look very “modern”. Be careful to not crack your egg.
2. Coloring Your Easter Eggs in a Batik Design
Take tacky glue or blue gel school glue and dot the egg. When the glue is dry, you can then dye the egg by dipping the whole egg into the water, or you can use a dropper to drip specific areas of your egg. I love the way these circles turned out!
3. Use a Hot Glue Technique when Coloring Easter Eggs
Here’s a super cool idea that makes fun designs on your Easter Eggs with Hot Glue. Try it out!
4. Dye a Humpty Dumpty Egg when Coloring Easter Eggs
Dip half of your egg in one color and the top half in another color, leaving a band of white in the middle. You can make Humpty Dumpty! Draw a face and viola! Your own “Egg Man.” Read the nursery rhyme…and, if you are really adventurous, use a non-boiled egg and crack it! My kids thought that was great!
5. Color Your Eggs Like Speckled Eggs
To make a speckled egg, we added some drops of regular food coloring, to Paas dye pills. They do not mix well together. The result was some speckling and I loved it! We mixed some of our dyes this way and left the others plain. What happened when we added red food coloring to the blue dye? Bright purple speckles, the red speckles on the orange were not so bright, nor was red on yellow, but we had fun experimenting.
6. Using Easter Egg Coloring to Learning Colors
Teach kids about primary and secondary colors. We discovered that mixing the brilliant red with a touch of yellow made a bright orange color. Remember that yellow and blue makes green, and that red and blue make purple.
7. Paint Your Egg when Coloring Eggs
For a fun watercolor effect, use a paintbrush to add dye to boiled eggs. Kids will have fun painting their eggs!
8. Easter Egg Coloring for Drip Dye Eggs
Using the medicine dropper, drip a color onto your egg (we used orange on one egg and blue on another). Then drop another color over it. What happens to the colors? Ours separated and mixed in some areas making a really fun tie-dyed look.
Check out how to make this Easter egg art perfect for preschoolers…actually, I take that back this is so fun that even though it is extremely easy craft, every age will enjoy it…
EASTER EGG FUN FROM KIDS ACTIVITIES BLOG
How did you dye your Easter eggs? How did your Easter egg coloring turn out this year?
