Egg dyeing takes an ancient turn

There are Easter eggs, and then there are Ukrainian Easter eggs. And once you’ve tried your hand at making the extraordinarily ornate designs that originated in Eastern Europe so many centuries ago, you’ll never be able to go back to the Paas egg-dyeing kits you loved as a kid.

My introduction to Ukrainian eggs — Pysanky as they’re called — began a couple of weeks ago in a cabin by the Clark Fork River near Thompson Falls, where my sister-in-law and world-class crafter had planned a girls' weekend out. Our goal was to master making Ukrainian Easter eggs.

My youngest daughter actually was the instigator for this particular outing; she’s a crafty crafter in her own right.

First we watched a videotape featuring an elderly lady of Ukrainian descent named Luba Perchyshyn, who come to find out is world-renowned in the art of Pysanky. After a rousing pep talk from Luba and some instructions we were ready to tackle our first designs.

If you’ve ever taken a close look at Ukrainian eggs, they’re exactly as difficult to make as it might seem. Using an ancient-looking kistka, a tool that consists of a tiny metal funnel attached to a stick with copper wire, we painstakingly drew our designs in beeswax, all huddled over candles to ensure a steady stream of melted wax.

It’s an art in which there’s no room for error, but we made plenty of mistakes. Sometimes blobs of wax would ooze out of the kistka and onto the egg, upsetting the symmetry of our designs. Our wax lines were far from straight at the onset, but we persevered.

One gal spent more than two hours on a single egg, only to have it slip out of her hands at the last moment.

“Noooooo,” we all cried. We sympathized and lamented.

Our mantra became: “What would Luba do?” as we faced the various obstacles that accompany the craft.

The process involves many layers of wax and dyeing the egg at various intervals to create different colors. Then more time is spent over the candles, melting the wax off to reveal the completed design.

As we toiled over the eggs hour after hour, we imagined past generations of women gathered around kitchen tables, crafting these treasured eggs that are wrought with meaning and symbolism. Egg dyeing dates back to pagan times, and when Christianity was introduced to Ukraine in 988 A.D. the designs took on different meanings. For example, triangle designs that had symbolized air, fire and water became symbols for the Holy Trinity — Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

Whether it was crafter camaraderie or the hypnotizing effect of all those candles, we found ourselves completely mesmerized by this ancient but newfound art.

I went home and ordered my own set of egg-making supplies and we vowed to make more eggs when we gathered at my sister-in-law’s home in Bonners Ferry, Idaho, for this Easter weekend. We may have permanently added a new tradition to our Easter festivities.

When I told my mother about the eggs, she wondered if I had ever mastered rosemaling, the Scandinavian decorative painting that reflects my own heritage.

“No,” I said sheepishly, explaining that the paints I’d bought 25 years ago had dried up and I threw them out years ago.

We decided we should again try our hand at the scrolling artwork that once decorated Norwegian butter churns and benches. Maybe that will be the focus of our next girls' weekend craft-o-rama.

 Features editor Lynnette Hintze may be reached at 758-4421 or by e-mail at lhintze@dailyinterlake.com.