2nd Annual Martha Stewart Easter Egg Challenge

Dear Friends:
Another Easter, another Martha Stewart egg fail.

Martha Stewart's version:

our version:

Here's my conclusion: you cannot wing Martha Stewart crafts. They're just about impossible to begin with, but to come close to having yours end up remotely like Martha's, you've got to be ultra prepared, and that means buying the specific craft tools called for and freeing up at least 4 hours of your time, not counting all the gathering of her rare tools.

I did make some changes this year despite what you might think from the results. Per Martha's recommendation, I used food coloring instead of a Paas kit, but even still, my eggs ended up all spotty and mottled.

The basic gist of Martha's egg dying process this year was to block off a section with tape, dip the egg into one color, then tape it off again in a slightly different area and dip it into another color. I didn't use the vinyl tape Martha called for but I did test out a few different kinds of tape I had on hand, ultimately deciding on gaffe tape. (Uh, shoulda sprung for the vinyl.)

So... as usual, the eggs didn't turn out so good, but on the flip side, the Easter egg hunt was a blast and the following senior year superlatives were given out to the stand out eggs of the class:

Class Clown: Spotty Red

Most Likely To Succeed:

Most Athletic:

Best Couple: Black-n-Blue and Messed-Up Orange

The final lesson? Of all the magazine covers, Martha's are the hardest (by far) to recreate--they always look a little too perfect and maybe it's just me, but I can never seem to come even close to them. If anyone has had more successful results on these eggs, I would LOVE to hear from you!

Also, This month's Martha Stewart Living had not one, not two, but THREE covers. (Please stop reading my diary, Martha.) Stay tuned for cover attempt #2...