Eggs 4--Rubber Cement Eggs

Today is one of the rare days this week with a double post. I want to continue to update you with the progress and techniques that I am using this week for decorating eggs. I posted earlier today regarding my Iron Craft Challenge. Tomorrow morning, I will have a morning post regarding the Iron Craft Challenge that I am hosting. Tonight and tomorrow night, I will be posting more egg decorating.

Today's project are what I call Rubber Cement Eggs. The concept is similar to the Liquid Frisket that is used in watercolor painting. In watercolor, you draw your design and the parts of the design that you do not want a background color wash to cover is covered with liquid frisket. It creates a bond that does not allow the color to seep through. It is the same concept as using masks in stamping. Because of the expense and waste involved with this procedure when dealing with decorating eggs, I use rubber cement rather than liquid frisket. It is much more affordable and readily available. My brand of choice is Elmers. Be sure to use a fresh bottle because once it doesn't become liquid it is hard to use for this type of project.

Supplies:

Rubber Cement (I used Elmers)

Blown Out Eggs

wooden skewers or thin dowels

Poster Putty (this is that putty that you use to put up light weight items): I used Blue Stik. Any brand is fine.

Two food containers that are wider than your skewers (smaller one is the gluing container, larger one is the drying container)

Adhesive Remover/Eraser

Note: You can do this with hard boiled eggs but they are much more difficult to maneuver when applying the rubber cement.If you want a similar technique for boiled eggs, use rubber bands or string and cover the eggs before dyeing. The areas covered by the rubber bands/strings will be white.

Step One: Assembling your gluing station

Assemble your gluing station. I put my materials on top of a pizza box so it would be elevated a little bit. You want the shortest distance between your glue jar and your gluing container. Take a small piece of the Poster Putty and make a ball. Run the skewer through the putty until it is about half way down the skewer. The distance is negotiable. You simply want the egg to be somewhere away from the lip of your drying container.

The gluing station

Step Two: Covering the Eggs

Place an egg on the skewer and gently push the egg against the putty. This will keep one end of the egg steady. Lift the application brush out of the glue jar and wait until there is a steady stream of glue. Quickly move the brush so that the stream of glue starts to drizzle over the egg. Rotate the egg in all directions so that the glue covers the egg. Use a random motion to add more interest to the design. Do not brush the glue onto the egg. Every place where the glue appears will be white once you color the egg. 

I usually only use one application of glue. Once the glue does not stream/drizzle from the brush, I stop. You can easily add another dip into the jar and continue if you want. I do this gluing over the small container so it can catch any stray glue. This will also catch the glue in that small time when you are transferring the brush from the bottle to the egg.

Step Three: Let the Eggs Dry

Place the skewers over the larger container so each end of the skewer is over an edge of the container and let them dry completely. I usually let mine dry overnight but as long as the glue is not tacky you can dye them.

Drying station

Step Four: Dyeing the Eggs

You can color these in a variety of ways. If I want the white to show through, I tend to color them in lighter and pastel colors (see the top picture). Allow to dry.

Remove the rubber cement. Take an adhesive remover (it is like a big eraser and can be found in the scrapbook section) and remove the dried rubber cement.

If you want a two color egg, dye the eggs in a darker color and allow to dry. Remove the rubber cement and dye the egg in a light color. The lighter color will change all the areas that were originally white and covered by the rubber cement.

I will have examples of the two color eggs tomorrow.