Practice Wooden Egg

I painted a wooden egg with red watercolor.  It took several coats, but it was soaking into the wooden egg nicely.  Then I used white acrylic to paint a design on.  It looked like I wanted it to look at that point.  But when I put a coat of varnish on it, the red watercolor smeared over the white acrylic.  It doesn't look as smeary in the picture as it does in real life. That was not the effect I was aiming for.  I didn't want to waste an egg (the practice egg was one that an i screw had broken off in), so I painted a wooden egg cup with red watercolor.  Then I put a coat of varnish on.  Then I painted the decoration with white acrylic.  Then I painted a coat of varnish over it.  The red was sealed so it didn't smear.  Also, the acrylic went on smoothly.  I had thought it might bead up on it.  Success.  I think I will do another egg cup with a red acrylic base coat, then a white acrylic decoration, then a coat of varnish to see how that does.