And this miserably cold weekend was, I thought, the perfect weekend to assemble one: Sholto and I would blow eggs together before painting them. I even found some pictures of Faberge eggs to inspire us:
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Obviously, this was one of my more delusional weekend plans. What actually happened was this:
Day one: we set out to go to the florist but Sholto had a melt down before we'd even got a tiny bit of the way: "No NO too cold I'm too cold don't make me Mummy DON'T MAKE ME."
Day two: we made it to the florist, only to discover that the twiggy blossom branches look like they might never actually flower, so we bought pussy willow. However, no sooner had I handed over the cash then another tantrum erupted "I carry them! I CARRY THEM! WANT TO STROKE THEM! GIVE THEM TO ME!" By now Esmeralda was also crying because she was cold. Unsurprisingly, we somehow failed to make it to the shop to buy eggs. And then when we did finally get home, Sholto, who has a constitution to rival the most delicate of lovelorn poets in tuberculosis-ridden 19th century Paris, was sick. By which time I had remembered that eggs are deceptively hard to blow, anything Sholto is allowed to paint for longer than about forty-five seconds turns out generic toddler-brown, and my artistic skills (and patience) are certainly not up to replicating Faberge.
So we decided to watch a Bollywood Film together - Sholay - because it's my favourite, and it's got a good train scene, which I knew Sholto would enjoy. It's Bollywood does Western, and has, in what was my pre-marriage opinion, one of the most romantic scenes of any film in the world: a girl dances on broken glass to save the man with whom she is in love (note that I said pre-marriage. These days my idea of romance is my husband doing all the washing up, unprompted.) And it covers Holi, the Hindu festival of colour:
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I have often longed to be in India for Holi, ever since I read about it in Vikram Seth's A Suitable Boy - seriously, how much fun does it look? - and it's now, this week, Tuesday, and yet again I'm not there. (Mainly because the very idea of going to India - or indeed anywhere further than Cornwall - with both our children is too exhausting to contemplate for longer than the time it takes to nod sadly and agree that we just can't do it.) But Sholto certainly got something from the film: on seeing all the coloured powder being thrown around he perked up dramatically and said "Mummy! Paint eggs like that!" So we're going to try. Just as soon as either a.) the sun has come out and we can decorate eggs outside or b.) I've summoned up the energy to not be all OCD about the kitchen.
In the mean time, a still not entirely recovered Sholto is playing the Stella McCartney 'Decorate Your Stella Easter Egg' game, which is quite simply amazing:
http://www.stellamccartney.com/experience/us/stellas-world/kids/
So if we never quite get around to playing Holi, this is what our eggs will doubtlessly look like this year. It's not exactly Faberge, but it's a lot more fun.
