Eco-friendly waste paper? Well, more neighbor-friendly ...

October 23, 2009 8:41 PM

I'm working on reproducing an old childhood amusement with less messy waste or just dealing with ignoring the debris .... eggs to throw at each other.

Every year, our grade school had a number of huge fundraising drives. One of my absolute favorites was confetti eggs.

Simple: Break eggs at top, leaving at least 3/4 of the shell intact. Use eggs as usual, rinse and set shell aside.

When you have enough, fill them 1/2 way with confetti, spray glue on some tissue over the hole, then spray paint.

When dry, throw at your friends. Hilarity ensues.

So far I've got two dozen shells - but I'm imagining the social karma damage if we do this in the neighborhood .... is there something more bio-degradable than shredded paper you can buy in bulk? I'd not want to use the cross cut diamonds from my personal junk mail pile ...

I'd thought about seeded paper but then everyone with their perfect lawns would have "weeds" ...

What else can I fill them with? Or just let the paper biodegrade for a few months? I'd suggest it to my kid's school as a fundraiser but they don't do outdoor carnivals, they just sell wrapping paper. But if they weren't "that bad" now adays ... maybe I should.

posted by tilde to sports, hobbies, & recreation (13 comments total)

How about some tissue-thin rice paper? The first rain storm will pretty much dissolve it down to nothing.
posted by Netzapper at 8:46 PM on October 23, 2009

Birdseed? I think that's the PC thing to use at weddings these days.
posted by AlliKat75 at 8:53 PM on October 23, 2009

Rice? You could food-color dye three colors plus white.
posted by weapons-grade pandemonium at 8:54 PM on October 23, 2009

How about some kind of food? Bread crumbs? Crushed up corn chips? Cheerios?
posted by MegoSteve at 8:55 PM on October 23, 2009

Hmm, maybe carpenter's chalk? It's a brightly coloured powder that you buy in plastic bottles at the hardware store to refill chalk lines (used to mark straight lines for cutting). It would make a nice splotch on impact but would soon wash away.
posted by Flashman at 9:17 PM on October 23, 2009 [1 favorite]

I remember Cascarones. How about using some of those cornstarch packing peanuts. Just crush them up and use them. They degrade very quickly with a little water or rain.
posted by sanka at 9:22 PM on October 23, 2009

I second breadcrumbs. If you played this game around a park where pigeons flock, not just the kids will get into the action.
posted by Sully at 9:30 PM on October 23, 2009

What about the naturally colored kind of powders used for Holi? This is basically what they're designed for (minus the eggs), so they should be fun but wash away easily.
posted by booksandlibretti at 9:36 PM on October 23, 2009

Oh wow, I did an image search for "holi powder".. that looks FUN!
posted by Sufi at 2:38 AM on October 24, 2009

How about the confetti sprinkles you use on cupcakes? They'd just melt away.
posted by jrossi4r at 7:29 AM on October 24, 2009

(on the other hand now that I give it a bit more thought, carpenter's chalk would be expensive if you needed to fill more than just a dozen or so eggs, and if you wanted more than one colour. If you could find some of the holi powder though... )
posted by Flashman at 8:41 AM on October 24, 2009

Grr - gremilns ate my answer.

Holi powder does look fun. But the issue with that and Carpenter's chalk is the too fine particles. If I were doing this for adults, then I'd say yeah. Like dry paint balls we can lob around as a game like with lacrosse or similar tools.

Cascarones - I had no idea how old a tradition this is - and probably older than that, very pagan like.

I like the idea of rice paper, cornstarch packing peanuts - but so LIGHT - maybe combining with birdseed or the sugar confetti to give it some weight when they throw them at each other ...

I wish I'd thought about this for my wedding (though I don't think the venue would have allowed it) - I would have loved to have bird seed eggs in the courtyard. And fun making them. :)

Thanks, everyone! I'll keep checking back and marking very good answers for my needs, though I do like the colored rice and birdseed options and others might as well.

These actually remind me of the seed ball idea - and I could probably do the same thing with these (my original idea was to save these and use them as plant starters but I got to thinking about the fun of confetti egg throwing ...)
posted by tilde at 5:14 PM on October 24, 2009

Don't we not throw rice at weddings anymore because birds eat the grains, and then they expand in their little bellies and hurt the birds (or kill them)? I thought that was why throwing birdseed at weddings became popular.
posted by purpletangerine at 7:56 PM on October 24, 2009