This past weekend, I hosted an arts & crafts table at the Jersey City Cultural Diversity Festival. I had to think of an activity that could entertain a few hundred children - and bracelets seemed like the obvious choice for a cultural celebration ;)
To make your own 'End of Summer' bracelets at home, you will need:
Pipe Cleaners, Assorted Beads, Pasta, Straws, Scissors
After googling the pasta dying process online, I found a great blog post by the Artful Parent. I must thank her greatly for the perfect recipe for this - which I tried below:
In order to color the raw ziti or penne, add a splash of rubbing alcohol to a plastic bag filled with pasta as shown. Swish the rubbing alcohol around in a closed bag of pasta, then open the bag and add a few drops of food coloring. Swish the contents once more until the pasta is coated in the color of your choice. A drop of blue and a drop of red makes a deep purple, etc.
I let the bags sit for a few hours for the color to set properly - and then opened them up to dry the pasta on a plate covered in foil.
**If you don't have rubbing alcohol at home, you can use white vinegar. I must say the beads seem to retain the smell - so rubbing alcohol is ideal.**
To make a bracelet with the pasta, form a little loop at the end of a pipe cleaner and add a cut straw bead so the beads don't fall off as the kids work. (A big thank you to my mom who helped me loop over one hundred of these for the event!)
This craft went over really well with kids from 3.5 to 10 years of age. I hope your children enjoy it as well!
xo Lady Lucas
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