These Panoramic Easter Eggs give me all kinds of nostalgic feelings.
Whats going on Flockers? I know the world outside is crazy and the world inside feels crazy right now, but I hope you're all well and we will get through this TOGETHER! Today I thought we would travel back to our childhoods and visit a time that was simple and all it took to make us happy was an overload of sugar lol. We are going to make Faux Panoramic Sugar Easter Eggs. I remember my mom and the other church ladies making these every year as a fundraiser and I always looked forward to having one in my Easter Basket!!!
Supplies...
Elmer's School Glue (clear or white will work, I used clear)
Epsom Salt (I found mine at Dollar Tree)
Large Plastic Egg (This was from Target last year, but they can also be found online.)
Razor Blade or Exacto Knife
Sharpie
Optional Supplies...
Acrylic Paint
Bunny or other item to put inside the egg.
Step 1,
Finding your front...
The focal point will be the open area that you look into. I used a two part plastic egg that was just about the right size for the opening I wanted for this project. I estimated what looked to be the center area of the egg and used a sharpie to trace the shape so I would have an outline of what needed to be cut out. You don,t have to do an egg shape cut out, you could also do a circle or any other shape you wanted.
Step 2, Removing the front...
So cutting plastic isn't always the easiest thing to do. Some people say warm the knife or blade before cutting while others say use a new blade every time. I am one of those that use a new blade. Be careful while cutting your plastic we don't want anyone to cut open a finger or anything. I found that with the type of plastic this egg was made from that I needed to use a sawing motion in some areas while others it cut with no problem. I did realize afterwards that I could have used my Drimel and done this a lot easier.
Step 3, Sugar it up...
First, Take a paper plate or a cookie sheet and pour all your Epsom salt on to it. Then using a foam or regular brush coat the entire outside of the egg with a thick coat of glue. Once you have covered your egg with the glue roll it in the Epsom salt. This will help cover most of the egg. If you miss any spot while rolling the egg you can always roll again or just apply more salt by hand. Below are a few more photos of my egg. In some place my "Sugar" is thicker than others but I am ok with that!
Step 4, Frost it up...
You might remember for Valentine's Day I made cup cakes and a cake using Dollar Tree Caulk, well I used that same technique here. Take your tube of caulk and cut the tip off. Put the tip against the egg and squeeze and pull up at the same time this will create small Hershey Kiss shapes. You will want to start at the center of the bottom of your opening and go all the way around until you reach the bottom again. Try and keep your kiss shapes to about the same size. Remember they don't have to be perfect, mine never are. You might have a little trouble getting your kisses to stay in place due to the faux sugar. If so, just remove some sugar from that area and try again. I had this happen in a few different spots. Once you have finished the opening let it sit for an hour or so to harden up before moving on to the rest of your egg. I didn't take a picture of the rest of the egg and where I put my frosting but you will see it in later steps. To add the frosting I started from the bottom of the side and went straight up and over and back down to the other side of the egg. This was done for decoration only. On a real egg this would be done to cover the seam of the two pieces being put together.
Step 5, Optional mini cake...
Grab a small styrofoam round to use as a platform inside your egg to add a bunny or flowers. Below you will see I used the same technique as we did around the egg and opening to cover the styrofoam to make it look like a small cake.
The caulking is white but you have options if you want it to be a different color. So option one is to let it dry and then paint it with an acrylic paint or spray it. Option two, which is what I did is to open your tube of caulk and cut the tip off then using a syringe or a flavor injector with a needle you can draw your paint using the syringe and then inject it into the caulk through the opening of your tube. If you do it this way you will need to close your tube and shake it and kinda squeeze it around to get the color to mix in. Mine didn't mix perfect but I like how it turned out. Before you start applying your caulk to the styrofoam itself do a few tests to make sure the paint mixed and isn't all sitting at the top of your tube. Let this dry for a few hours before you add it into your egg as shown below. I did not glue my mini cake into place I just set it inside, you could glue it in if you wanted.
Step 6, Adding the Prize...
I found this great Vintage ceramic Easter Bunny at the thrift store and it fit perfect on top of my Mini Cake. You could also do a cluster of flowers, a golden egg, butterflies, or your kids favorite action figure. There is really no limit to what you could use inside.
Step 7, BONUS IDEA...
Faux Chocolate Egg, How freaking great is this! I used the same process for this egg as I did for the sugar egg. instead of covering with glue and rolling in the Epsom salt I used satin leather brown Krylon Spray paint. For the faux frosting I again used the caulking but I wanted to try something different so I squeezed the caulk into a pastry bag and used a star tip. I really like the look of using the star tip but I found I wasted a lot of caulking this way but at a dollar a tube it was ok. Get this, I got the pastry bag set from Dollar Tree also! The bunny on the inside of this one is another vintage bunny I wrapped in gold foil.
Final Product...
These beautiful Easter Panoramic Eggs are what memories are made of and make me feel a little happier in a time that the world around me seems a little to crazy. I hope that you will make some and share them with me, It really would bring a smile to my face. I can't wait to see what y'all come up with. Until next time...