The Creative Wild: Creative DIY: Giant Bubbles

Hello creatives!

Today's post is SO much fun, I promise you. From the time we're children, bubbles have fascinated and amused us during the warm summer months. By the time you reach adulthood, the little bubbles in a jar don't quite cut it anymore, and it's time to up the ante. When TJ and I were last in NYC together, we saw buskers with these huge bubbles in Central Park, so when I came across the recipe of Pinterest, I obviously had to try it.

Not only is this a really cool activity to do with kids (it will entertain them for hours), but it'll entertain the big kids (us) too. I threw together a batch of giant bubbles for a small birthday gathering I had, in which I knew children would be attending. Because TJ and I don't have kids, we don't have a lot of cool things for kids to play with they come over, so I figured this was a simple and effective way to entertain the little ones. As it turned out, I'm fairly certain that the adults got as much, if not more, enjoyment out of it then the kids did.

The bubble recipe I adapted from this blog post, found on the Tatortots and Jello blog. I've made this recipe for huge bubbles both in the US (when I was visited TJ's family), and here at home in Canada and found it more difficult to obtain the ingredients here at home. Surprised? Me either. One of the frustrations of all the great DIYs and recipes to come out of the US. We just don't have all the stuff.

But, I did make do so I'm sharing with you today, not just the recipe but where I got the stuff. Hope you find that helpful.

Ingredients:

Distilled water (4L)
Clear dish soap (3 cups)
Glycerin (100ml)

Materials (all found at Home Depot):

Bucket
Wooden dowels
3lb cotton string
Eye hooks
4 Metal washers

First step, pour in your distilled water. You can get distilled water in any grocery store in the pop/bottled water aisle. Add to the water your 3 cups of clear dish soap. The original recipe called for clear and unscented, which I couldn't find. Perhaps larger stores carry it, but I was unable to find it. The clear worked just fine and smelled lovely. Once you've added the dish soap stir gently so as to not created a foamy mess.

I'm only sort of good at that. There's a bit of foam. But it turned out just fine.

Next up, glycerin. In the original post, they suggested finding glycerin at your local craft store in the soap making section. My closest craft store (Michael's) is 20 minutes away, so I opted for the pharmacy section at Walmart. Score. But I did have to ask the pharmacist where it was, and I'd never had found it otherwise. It was with the witch hazel and other weird stuff for your skin. And it looks like this.

Once you've added the glycerin, do the same with the gentle stirring. Take it easy, remember: foam bad.

Now, onto the magnificent bubble making wands. Screw your eye hooks one end of each wooden dowel. Using your 3lb cotton string (pictured below and found at Home Depot), cut one string at about 100 inches, and a second string at around 70 inches. You can make them smaller if you want - just make sure one is approximately 2/3 the size of the largest one. Tie one end of the shorter string around one eye hook, and the other end around the other hook. You've created the top string of the bubble maker.

Do the same with the larger string, but run the string through the four metal washers so they weigh it down in the middle when it's held up.

When you've attach both strings, they should be tied around the eye hook like so:

So that when you hold the wooden dowels out, the strings create a triangle, like this:

Once this is completed, you simply dip the the string in the bubble solution, lift them up, open them to create the triangle, and make the bubbles happen! You can either walk backwards, swing the wands to the side, open them to the wind, whatever works best for you. Check out our photos below to see how we managed.