Baked Cotton Balls, and A Rainbow Rain Storm!

Hello to all my followers! I know it has been quite awhile since I posted last, so I decided it was about time for me to post something new! Today's projects are both activities that we did quite awhile back, since the summer has mostly been about Conrad wanting his free time, or doing repeat activities.

Baked Cotton Balls

For this project, you will need the following items :

• 2 cups Flour
• 2 cups Water
• Food Coloring
• Cotton Balls
• Small paint cups or containers
• Baking Pan /Cookie Sheet
• Cooking Spray
• Hammer

Note: if you don't like messy projects, this one is not for you! :)

Set the Oven to 300 degrees. Spray the baking pan with the cooking spray,

To start, you need to make a mixture similar to glue using the flour and water. Pour the Water over the flour, and mix them together. Once you have finished, divide the mixture into the small cups(one for each color you choose). Put three or four drops of food coloring into each cup and mix them up. Now you are ready for the fun! :)

Dip the cotton balls in the mixture, and coat them completely one by one. Once they are coated, place them on the  pan.

The following are some pictures of the process of dipping the cotton balls and placing them on the pan.

Once all the cotton balls are dipped and placed on the pan, you need to put them in the oven, and bake them for 45 minutes to an hour.

When they are finished baking, they should look something like this:

Once they have cooled, then you can choose to leave them as they are as a piece of artwork, or you may continue on to the next step.




Place the finished product into a tub or some sort, or take them outside to the sidewalk. Give the child a hammer ( as you can see, I used a wooden hammer from Conrad's toy tool set)

Now, let the child use their imagination to do what they choose with them. Conrad first decided to try and rip them apart/ break them up.

Here is is showing me that he was able to pull one of the cotton balls out of the hard shell it was in! :)

Here he is hammering the cotton balls to break them apart. He had a blast ripping and hammering, and breaking the shells.

here is the link to the blog I got this idea from

Rainbow Rain Storm

For this activity, you need the following items:

• a large jar
• water
• dish soap
• Food coloring

This is a fun project that is also a science experiment. It helps to show a little bit how a rain cloud works, and it is very pretty (if you like rainbows and mixing colors like I do)

The first step is to slowly fill the jar with warm water. while you are doing this, add a few drops of the dish soap into the jar. Once there is a good layer of suds on top of the water, you have filled the jar full enough. Now you are ready to begin the experiment!

Drop a few drops of food coloring in various places over the top of the suds, as seen here. I dropped three to four drops to create each separate color spot here, being sure to mix a few of them together.













And now, the watching and waiting begins...

Soon, you will begin to see the colors leaking through the Suds and mixing into the water.

The More you watch, the more the colors will mix and swirl, creating a lovely mixture of color in the suds, and making a beautiful rainbow underneath.

For this Activity, the suds represent the clouds, and the food coloring represents the moisture in the air that evaporates . Underneath the "clouds" is the color, which then represents the rainstorm in the air! :)

Conrad loved this project so much, we emptied out the jar, and did the project again so he could watch! :)