I had been sourcing supplies to try layering coloured sand in bottles, when I saw this kit advertised in the Scholastic Book Club (Australia). It was a good opportunity for the kids to try this craft activity on a small scale. The kit came with small bags of coloured sand, plastic bottles and stoppers, a little funnel and a styling stick. The sand was purple, orange, blue, pink and yellow.

Each of the kids picked a bottle and got started. Surprisingly we had very few spills of sand, and the kids were very careful pouring it into the funnel. They even took turns using the funnel to pour sand into their bottles. It was nice to see them sharing.

A’s first bottle was very tall and skinny, so it didn’t take much sand to make thick layers. L made her layers reasonably flat, while A liked her layers to be angled. They were unable to use the styling stick on these bottles, as the shape of them prevented the stick getting to the edge to push the sand down.

A filled another bottle and we were able to use the styling stick in this one as the sides were straight and flat. A would pour a few layers, and then scrape the stick down the inside to push some of the sand down through the layers, forming unique variations in the layers. This looked really good.

Once the bottles were filled, we placed a stopper in the top to prevent the sand escaping. The sand settled a little too. Then they were ready to be displayed.

This was a fun activity, and the kids really liked it. The only disappointing thing was that the plastic of the bottles wasn’t as clear as glass would have been. As we poured the sand into the bottle some coloured dust stuck to the inside of the bottles dulling the colours a bit. This was a fairly minor issue though, and it didn’t detract from the fun of filling the bottles with sand.

I would like to try this activity again using glass bottles and other colours of sand. The layers of sand in the bottles look fantastic displayed on our shelf.