What is at the end of a rainbow? Gold, of course! In my End of the Rainbow sensory bottle gold glitter slowly falls, revealing a rainbow inside the bottle! This craft is great for St. Patrick’s Day, or for any time you want to find the gold at the end of a rainbow.
Note: This sensory bottle is challenging and time consuming to make. For a simple version, check out my Easy Rainbow Sensory Bottle.
I have been wanting to create a rainbow sensory bottle for a long time, but how to do it? It was very hard for me to come up with a unique idea and once I did, it was super challenging to execute. I even enlisted help from my husband (this is the first sensory bottle he has been involved in). Needless to say, this sensory bottle is by far the most difficult I have ever made. There were a couple of times that I just put it in the cabinet for a few weeks, feeling defeated. In the end, I had put so much time and effort into it, I just couldn’t give up!
My original idea was to glue some ribbons to the lid of a bottle so that they would hang down inside, add my liquid ingredients and gold glitter, shake it up, and voila! If only it had been that simple…
The process:
I found a small wooden disc and filed it down so that it fit perfectly inside the lid of the bottle, then cut it in half. Next, I used super glue to sandwich the ribbons between the halves of the wooden disc, clamping it for 24 hours. Then I used silicone to glue the wooden disc into the lid of the bottle, again clamping for 24 hours. All of these steps were simply to ensure that the ribbons were all lined up neatly and hanging from the center of the lid.
When I put the ribbons in the bottle with the liquid and glitter, they looked small and sad, floated around, and got tangled. It was not a rainbow at all. So, I decided to thread some plastic beads on the ribbons, hoping to make them stand out more and keep them from floating. The beads looked really nice, but I still had the problem of the individual strands floating around and getting tangled.
Finally, I threaded fishing line between adjacent beads, forcing them to stay lined up. Surprisingly, this also helped with the floating issue. Now when I shake up the bottle, the beads gets a little wavy, but all of the colors line up really nicely to make a beautiful rainbow! Whew! It only took me six weeks to figure this one out!
If you have a lot of spare time and want to tackle the challenge of creating this End of the Rainbow Sensory Bottle, here is what I used:
The links in this post contain affiliate links and I will receive a small commission from qualifying purchases (at no extra cost to you).
- 16oz craft bottle – Amazon
- Wooden disc – Michael’s
- Ribbon (or string, thread, etc.) – Amazon (This link is for Amazon, but it’s cheaper at Michael’s, I just couldn’t find a link on Michael’s website. Since it’s just used for threading the beads, string or thread would work just as well.)
- Gorilla Glue for disc and ribbon – Amazon
- Silicone glue – Amazon
- Plastic faceted beads (20 of each: red, orange, yellow, green, blue, purple) – Amazon
- Fishing line – Amazon
- 1 2/3 cup warm water
- 2 tsp gold glitter – Amazon
- Fill to the top with clear Elmer’s glue (about 4 oz) – Amazon
- Super glue (for gluing the lid shut) – Amazon
Thank you for checking out my End of the Rainbow sensory bottle!
“In this you greatly rejoice, even though now for a little while, if necessary, you have been distressed by various trials, so that the proof of your faith, being more precious than gold which is perishable, even though tested by fire, may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ.”
1 Peter 1:6-7
~ Sarah ~
Is there any way you could demonstrate how you threaded the fishing line and beads? I tried zooming in still couldn’t tell. I’m so sorry. Hope it’s not too much of a pain.
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