When I was around 10 years old, I had a neighbor show me their collection of eggshells. He collected different types of shells over the span of many years. It was an interesting collection, and he told us how to do it. I may not collect eggshells, but I have found the information he gave us useful. Over the last several years I have emptied out eggs for many projects that I will list in this article, but first I want to go over the steps of how to do it along with tips and tricks that I’ve learned over the years.

Before you start hollowing out the egg there are some precursory steps to take. The first thing you will do is get a sewing pin and wash it with dish soap. Next, you will get a bowl to blow the egg into. Yes, you blow out the contents of the egg, so I would not recommend feeding these eggs to anyone other than yourself or your children. Also, you will get a wet washcloth; because, sometimes when blowing the contents of the egg out the pressure will cause some to bubble out the top when you take a breath. Lastly, you will grab your egg, and find where you want to work.

I have learned that before making the holes in the eggs you will want to shake it vigorously for about 10 seconds. It will start making a sloshing sound when you’ve shaken it enough. The reason you do this is it mixes the eggs together, so it doesn’t have as many thick sections. Next, you will take the sewing pin and make a hole in the bottom of the egg over the bowl. The bigger the hole the easier it will be to empty, but if you make the hole too big it loses its aesthetic appeal. One other thing to be aware of when making the hole, is if the egg cracks at all it is better to just crack that egg as the air pressure from blowing will cause it to explode in your hand otherwise. After making the hole in the bottom you will make a hole in the top of a similar size.

As you may have guessed the next step will be to blow in the top hole almost like you would a balloon. The pressure you make in the egg from blowing in the top hole should cause the contents of the egg to start coming out the bottom hole. If nothing comes out it may mean that your holes are too small. You may be aware that not all of the egg is the same consistency so sometimes the thicker part of the egg will hang down from the shell. It is often at this point that I will take the sewing pin, put it in the bottom hole, and circle it around or pull on the thicker contents to clear the hole for more to come out. You will continue this process until it is empty. You do want to ensure the entire yolk comes out. If the egg was not shaken beforehand will sometimes remain whole in the eggshell so you will need to break it to clear it out. The best ways to know that the egg is completely empty is when you blow nothing comes out, if you shake it no weight is moving around, and the shell is light. For the projects that I use the eggs for you do want to ensure it is completely cleaned out, so it does not start to stink over time. Once the egg is cleared out you will rinse the shell with water and dry. Some ideas of what to do with the contents of the eggs are:

Omelet Buffet – Everyone uses the eggs they cleared out of the shells to make a personal omelet for themselves.
Omelet
Scrambled eggs
Cookies – For you and your kids, not necessarily for anyone else, since there is a good chance some of your spit is in it.
Eggnog

After you have the number of eggshells you want, I would recommend boiling them as that extra precautionary step to ensure they are clean for the project of your choice. A few projects I have done over the years with eggshells are:

• Paint Eggs – We took a canvas, made a bunny with painter’s tape on it, then took paint filled eggshells, and threw them at the canvas. Once the paint was dry we took off the painters tape to expose the bunny surrounded by lots of color.
• Easter Eggs – We enjoy decorating eggs as much as the next person, but it can be hard to just throw them away after putting so much work into them. I don’t know about you, but I have never found a better alternative than decorating a legitimate eggshell. Luckily hollowed out eggshells can be kept as long as you would like.
• Message Eggs – You hide a message inside the empty eggshell to give to people.
• Decorations – Decorated eggs can make fun decorations especially during Easter time.

I truly hope that you found this article useful and that it leads to many fun projects for you in the future. As always, please leave feedback about what you think as I am always working on growing and improving. Thank you for reading!