Jack-O-Lantern Glow-in-the-Dark Sensory Bottle

This is a fun autumn/halloween sensory bottle with jack-o-lantern confetti that falls slowly. It even glows in the dark!

I wanted to create this post much earlier, but I ran into a lot of problems getting the glow-in-the-dark bottle to work the way I wanted it to. I was very close to giving up and not posting any Halloween sensory bottles at all, but I decided to go ahead. Even though I could not get it to work out the way I wanted it to, it is still a fun bottle.

What I originally wanted was a sensory bottle that had liquid that would glow in the dark, to which I would add my jack-o-lantern confetti. I tried SO many things, and ran into the same problem with all of them. It seems that no matter what type of glow-in-the-dark additive I used, they all had the same powdery base that would separate from the water and fall to the bottom of the bottle. When I would shake the bottle, the powder would re-disperse throughout the water, making it look like the water was glowing, but over time, the powder would all settle on the bottom of the bottle again. There are plenty of options to make water glow under black light, but as far as glowing in the dark all on its own, I have come up empty.

On the plus side, although the powder will end up on the bottom of the bottle, it is very slow to fall, so it makes the liquid appear to glow for a good amount of time.

My Jack-O-Lantern Glow in the Dark Sensory Bottle is made with glow-in-the-dark gel. I tried acrylic paint, but it did not glow nearly as well as the gel and it was also very opaque and made it hard to see the confetti. The first time I tried the gel, I just squirted some into the bottle, added the rest of my liquid ingredients, and shook it up. This did not work well. The gel was too clumpy and gloppy and no matter how hard I shook it, it would not dissolve completely, so I decided to treat it like a roux. 

I put some gel in the bottle, then, instead of filling the bottle to the top, I just added the water. I shook the mixture up until it seemed uniform, then added the rest of the liquid. This method worked well, and there were no clumps of gel floating around. I could see the tiny specks of glow-in-the-dark powder that had been in the gel swirling around in the bottle. I added the jack-o-lantern confetti, and that was it! The bottle glows really well after charging up in the sun for a few minutes and the jack-o-lanterns float gently to the bottom after three minutes or so. The glow powder remains suspended for upwards of 30 minutes and it glows about that long as well.

---

If you are interested in creating a Jack-O-Lantern Glow-in-the-Dark Sensory Bottle, this 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).

• 11 oz VOSS water bottle – Target
• 1 tsp glow-in-the-dark gel – Amazon
• 3 oz hot water
• 1 tsp jack-o-lantern confetti (I would have added more, but I ran out after failing with this bottle so many times!!) – Amazon
• Fill to the top with corn syrup (about 8 oz) – Amazon
• Super glue (for gluing the lid shut) – Amazon

---

Thank you for checking out my Jack-O-Lantern Glow-in-the-Dark Sensory Bottle!

“He changes a wilderness into a pool of water
And a dry land into springs of water;
And there He makes the hungry to dwell,
So that they may establish an inhabited city,
And sow fields and plant vineyards,
And gather a fruitful harvest.”

Psalms 107: 35-37

~Sarah~