Frozen Water Balloons

Well, I only pinned this idea a year ago... Maybe I am on the ball, because, really, how many things do people pin and how many of those pins do they actually accomplish? (I've never thought about the rate of attempting vs. just saving ideas, but I bet my track record is pretty good compared to most people.) Anyway, this wasn't something that the kids could really help me with, which was a bummer, but we all enjoyed the results. It was just something fun for yet another "snow day," which was really a "way too cold to go to school day and, therefore, you can't go outside and play day" -- of which we have had far too many this year! I lined them up along our porch railing so that we can easily see them from the living room window.

{A row of pretty frozen "eggs" on my porch railing}

Materials:

• water balloons 
• food coloring
• water
• pan to hold balloons (optional)
• scissors (optional)

Directions:

1. Stretch out your water balloon. Add a few drops of food coloring. (I used 3 drops per balloon. I made one balloon for each color of pure food coloring: red, yellow, blue, green, neon pink, neon purple, neon green, and neon blue plus I mixed a few colors. For example, orange = 2 yellow + 1 red.) Tip: Do NOT use regular balloons. Trust me on this. You will just end up with a mess of colored water!
2. Fill the balloon with water. (Mine came from Dollar Tree and the package included a little nozzle to attach to the faucet. It didn't stay well, though, so I secured it with packaging tape. If you decide to do that, have a towel handy! Actually, you may want a towel handy, anyway, since a few of the balloons are bound to leak. We lost two at this stage.) Tie the end of the balloon in a knot.
3. Place filled balloons outside to freeze. This takes a few hours. Be careful not to move them too soon, or they may pop. (This happened to me when I was checking on them about 2 hours later. I figured with the sub-zero temperatures that they might be ready. They weren't. One popped and made a mess on the front porch. I didn't check again for another 4 hours or so just to be safe!)
4. Remove the balloons and display your frozen "eggs." You could use scissors for this. I just peeled them off with my fingers. (Here I lost a couple that had become frozen into the purple puddle from the popped balloon that I moved prematurely. They ended up cracking when I tried to chisel them away with my boot.)

{Neon colors are surprisingly less vibrant.}

NOTE: If you enjoyed this project, you might also like making Colorful Frozen Ice Shapes. On another note, there are just a few days left for the Livingston Parent Journal's fundraising efforts. Please stop by their crowdfunding site and see if there is a way that you can help out! Thanks so much.

Water Balloon Painting!

This activity is definitely messy fun! You have been duly warned. It was an idea that I found here. While it sounds a bit kooky, I am always up for new ways of painting, so we had to try it out. The hardest part was getting them to be patient while I filled all the balloons, but once we were ready to go, the kids had a blast! If you're not afraid of getting of a bit messy, this is a great summer activity.

{Finished Painting by Mia, Age 6}

{Finished Painting by Logan, Age 3}

Materials:

• water balloons (Ours were from Dollar Tree.)
• paint (Ours was powdered tempera that I mixed up in small batches.)
• plastic dosing syringe (like the ones you get for administering oral antibiotics to little ones)
• paper (Ours was a roll of craft paper I got from a garage sale. I've also seen it at Dollar Tree. If you happen to have a roll of butcher block paper, that would work, too.)
• scissors
• masking tape
• bowl to hold the filled balloons (Nice, but not necessary, this came in handy as well when it was time to pick up the pieces of popped balloons.)
• towels, washcloths, wipes, or paper towel (for clean-ups!)

Directions:

1. I strongly recommend having everyone change into old clothing before starting. I asked my kids to go barefoot, but the pavement was hot, so we compromised and they wore their Crocs (easily cleaned up, so no worries).
2. Mix up your paints. I have 4 colors of powdered tempera paints: red, yellow, blue, and green, so I just mixed a small bit of water with each of those in my plastic paint cups. Then, I mixed red and yellow to get orange and red and blue to get purple, so we had a total of 6 colors to use. (Tip: If you have ready-made tempera paints, you can skip this step, but I think that powdered temperas are a good investment. You can make up as little or as much as you need for each use and it's easy to adjust the consistency to accommodate the type of paint project you are doing. In the end, I think they are cheaper, plus you don't have to worry about them drying out and being ruined.)
3. Add some paint to each water balloon, using a plastic dosing syringe. I think we filled about 20 balloons in total.
4. Next, add some water to each water balloon so that they are inflated more. Don't add too much water, though. They don't need to be as big as possible. (Tip: Honestly, I am wondering if this step since we had trouble getting them to pop, anyway, and this just diluted the paint. We tried only one balloon without the water, and while it was much smaller, it popped just the same -- with being stomped -- and the paint remained vivid and undiluted.)
5. Cut some paper off of your roll of craft paper (or butcher block paper) and adhere to a flat, smooth surface using masking tape. We did this in the driveway. Alternatively, you could weight the paper down with rocks, or skip this altogether if you are not concerned about it getting blown or moved in any way. (Tip: I recommend one piece of paper for EACH child. It's just easier this way.)
6. Now that you are all prepped, start making some art. Sadly, we found that the balloons did not pop when thrown at the paper. Rather, they bounced off and rolled away. So, I just suggested that Mia and Logan stomp on them, which they found to be great fun!

{Photos taken mid-pop!}

{See the splash? Messy fun!}

7.  Let your paintings air-dry. (Ours took about an hour on a bright, sunny day.) Then, remove them and display, if desired. Personally, I was thinking of this as a process-based project rather than a product-based one, but the results were pretty cool, so I found a place to hang each of the finished art projects. (Tip: Our finished paintings fit nicely on two different doors. I just made sure to place them above the doorknobs.)