—Lanmtar Farming, Saturday, March 15. 1975
42
Mrs . Barbara Bombei
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With the first day of spring only five days away and
Easter Just two weeks away women everywhere are
thinking about decorating, their spring wardrobes,
beautiful flowers, gardens and the various activities that
go along with this season of the year. Truly there is no
season that restores the hope of everyone as does spring.
For Christians, Easter with its annual observance of the
resurrection of Jesus, is the basis of their faith. The egg
has been the symbol of Easter and new life for time im
meorial. Some ladies might like to try their skills at the
ever popular art of decorating eggs for Easter this year.
There are many methods used.
Mrs. Barbara Bomberger, 60 S. Main Street, Manheim,
has become well known for her ability to decorate eggs
because she uses some very old methods and creates very
beautiful, unusual and interesting ones. She loves to show
people how to decorate them and thousands of people have
watched her at the Kutztown Folk Festival where she has
demonstrated dyeing and decorating eggs for nine years.
Her granddaughter, Sally Bomberger, has been her co
worker there die past couple years. They also make
cornhusk distlefinks (birds) and place an egg in them.
This festival is held for eight days, including the Saturday
before and after July fourth each year. This year it will be
held June 28 through July 5. This event has been going on
for 25 years. It was through Mrs. Bomberger’s teaching
Mrs. Mark Eaby to decorate eggs by the Fabrege method
that Mrs. Eaby’s husband, who manages this folk festival,
invited her to participate. She also demonstrates egg
decorating, mainly the scratch method, at Gimbels’
Pennsylvania Excitement Days in their downtown store in
Philadelphia the second week of May.
Although Mrs. Bomberger took a course at the Iris Club
eleven or twelve years ago in decorating eggs by the
decoupage method perhaps she inherited the talent and
the patience to excel in this art/ Her great-great
grandmother, Maria Brubaker, decorated them by the
Corner
Bicentennial Costumes
Although the actual bicentennial celebration of
our country will not take place for another year,
many people have asked us where they can find
patterns for the colonial costumes.
Fortunately, the pattern companies have been a
great help as many of them have already designed
and are offering patterns for the costumes with
costs beginning at $l.OO.
Many of the designs are for adults as well as
children and even offer patterns for the period
collars and accessories
For more information or to view the actual
patterns, consult the pattern books at your fashion
or sewing center or department store.
Federal Market Orders
For Fruits and Vegetables
Many people realize that there are market orders
for milk, yet few realize that there are also specific
market orders for fruits and vegetables. In fact
there are 48 market orders which provides for
fresh produce in every area of our country
Market orders are designed to cope with crops
grown in a specific area and to deal with the
marketing of the produce in regional areas
Market orders usually contain some information
of minimum quality requirements backed by
Federal Inspection so that the poorer quality crops
are held from the market.
Marketing orders also help in keeping the supply
of a commodity at levels that are best for con
sumers By allotment, crops are kept from being
marketed in surplus at any one time This helps to
reduce any sharp fluctuation in price.
For more information on the subject write to the
Information Division of the Agricultural Marketing
Service, USDA, Washington, D C. 20250
A Creative Egg Decorating Artist
by
Mrs.
Charles
McSparran
Farm Feature
Writer
with: Melissa Piper
ASSOCIATE EDITOR
er
Mrs. Barbara Bomberger, Manheim, her knife in
hand is scratch-carving an East er egg. She
decorated ail the interesting scratch-carved an-
scratch-carving method and one of hers, dated 1774 with
her initials M.B. and a beautiful rose and heart on it, has
been displayed at the Kutztown Folk Festival. It is the
oldest one of this type on record at this time. Mrs. Bom
berger also has a scratch-carved egg done by her grand
mother in 1889.
Mrs. Bomberger says she would never be able to count
the eggs she has decorated. She has given a lot away, has
many around their home, particularly in their large front
window at this Easter season, and sold some she made
while demonstrating at Kutztown.
She uses principally goose, duck, bantam and piegeon
eggs in her decorating, and uses the bantam eggs to make
necklaces and pigeon eggs to make matching earrings.
She has made at least a dozen necklance and earring sets.
Besides being attractive they look very old because of her
method of dyeing and finishing. Mrs. Bomberger has a
reserve of several goose eggs from her two geese which
she kept in her back yard and keeps the one surviving
goose at her niece’s farm.
Mrs. Bomberger employs methods of dyeing the eggs
used by her ancestors by boiling various things at hand:
yellow is produced from onion peel briefly steeped, which
is the oldest method of dyeing, saffron or celery leaves;
red from beet juice; brown from onion skins steeped to
desired brown, tea or coffee; green from early grass
clippings or spinach; black from alder or walnut bark;
and blue from blueberries. Straining the dye before
boiling the eggs produces plain colors. Various shades of
brown can be formed by laying eggs among the onion
skins. The same way, an interesting blue can be produced,
by mashing the blueberries and boiling the eggs with
them. The result is various shades of blue, light blue
where the seeds and skin touched the egg. Use white eggs.
The eggs must be clean and free from any trace of grease
to take the dye properly. Hard boiled eggs are easiest to
dye. Boil them gently for a half hour. This makes the yolk
and white so hard that they do not spoil and the eggs can
be kept whole indefinitely. Mrs. Bomberger has eggs that
are many years old and rattle when shaken.
To achieve various designs and colors gather small
leaves or weeds, wash and while wet lay on egg to form
design. Cover with onion skins, leaving small bare spaces.
Roll in cloth or a piece of nylon stocking, twist ends to
secure firmly then place eggs in red or blue dye. The egg
will be brown where onion skin touches and white outline
of leaves or weeds placed under onion skins. The un
covered part of egg will be red or blue according to dye
used. Also interesting colors can be achieved by wrapping
eggs in colored materials such as calico, which are not
dye set materials, and boiling gently for 20 to 30 minutes.
To produce a German variation of leaf decorated eggs,
wash leaves, flowers or grasses and dry them. Dip in a
small amount of salad oil or beaten egg white. Arrange
them on egg to form a design. Wrap in nylon stocking, tie
end close to egg to secure leaves. The nylon stocking gives
a slight textured appearance to the egg. Dip the egg in the
dyes until desired shade is produced. Remove the
wrapping and leaves when cool.
Mrs. Bomberger uses a zacto knife, razor blade, sharp
needle or other pointed instrument to scratch through the
dye to the natural color of the eggshell to create designs
such as rose and heart, animals or birds. She found an
easy way to finish and seal scratch-carved eggs is to rub
them in her hands with a small amount of varnish.
tiqued, decoupage and Fabrege eggs on the table,
many of which are operative.
The method she uses to remove contents of an egg for
decorating is to clean it a room temperature. Then she
makes a hole in the ends of the egg with a sharp needle or
ice pick, about one quarter inch in diameter. Break the
yolk with a long needle or cake tester. Shake hard, to
break the yolk and white. Use a syringe to blow air in the
Homestead
Notes
hold to force out contents. Wash out egg and set to dry
before using.
Blown eggs can be decorated in many ways and hung on
an Easter tree, to make jewelry cases or mounted in a
base which you can make from many household items
such as curtain rings, buttons, egg cups and perfume
bottle tops or can be purchased now at craft shops.
Rubber bands are easy to use to mark eggs in half length
wise for jewelry boxes. Use a number three pencil to mark
egg, also to section off egg in equal parts. The egg can be
cut with a jewelry hand saw or electric bench tool. Laces,
narrow ribbons or braids, sequins and pearls are used
around openings. Small ornaments can be purchased in
craft shops or figures cut out of cards to make interesting
insets.
Mrs. Bomberger uses the Fabrege method of decorating
in some cases. They are cut out and decorated with
jewels, pie name comes from Peter Carl Fabrege who
made this type of decorated tin eggs for the Czar of Russia
to present to his wife each Easter from around 1880 to the
early nineteen hundreds. Mrs. Bomberger used hinges,
Mrs. Bomberger, holding an egg which she dyed
blue with blueberries, shows some of her beautiful
dishes she keeps in her old corner cupboard which
was saved from her parents burning home when she
was less than five years old.
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