How to Dye Eggs

Step One: Prepare the dye.  You could cover your work surface with newspaper (does anyone take the paper anymore?) or wax paper, but I like to dig through the storage room for old plastic placemats that nobody remembers you still owned.  They stay in place well, and it's impossible to ruin these things.

Step One-A: Have you ever wondered what the color yellow tastes like?  Choose a willing taste tester. 

 Place dye tablets within her reach. 

 

Watch for facial evidence. 

 Hmm.  Yellow's not too bad.  

How about blue?

Step Two: Use the "magic crayon" to color designs on the hard-boiled eggs.  This is something you'll remember fondly when you're a mother someday.  Seeing your own children do this may cause nostalgia.

Step Three: Dip the eggs in the dye.  Take this step very seriously.   There should be no smiling and very little talking.  And remember: Whichever color your sister chooses, that's the color you need to use right away.  Leave several bowls of dye untouched while you both dunk your eggs in the same color.

Step Four: Allow your eggs to dry.  Admire the pretty colors and designs.  You may want to set them on the counter while you clean up the table, and then you may forget to put them in the fridge.  If this happens, you won't want anyone to eat them.  But that's okay, because you can just admire their pretty colors a little while longer.  You can always boil more eggs for consumption.

Step Five: At this point, your egg dyers might want to keep decorating eggs. Problem: You only boiled 18, and they're all colored by now.  Solution: Teach your children the craft of emptying an egg.  It's gross and sometimes difficult.  But they'll be up for a challenge.

Step Six: If, by the time they've emptied the eggs and rinsed and dried them, they become restless and decide not to color them after all...Send them outside before they start smashing egg shells over their heads and throwing empty eggs at each other like snowballs.