Bubble Rainbow

Materials you'll need

• Empty plastic water bottle
• Scissors (adult help needed)
• Baby wipes
• Rubber band
• Food coloring in several colors (we used red, yellow, green, teal, and pink)
• Large plate
• Dish soap
• Water
• Spoon

 

Step-by-step tutorial

Step 1: With an adult's help, cut a plastic water bottle in half. You'll use the top piece, the one with the cap opening.

Step 2: Stretch a baby wipe over the wide, cut edge of the bottle and secure it tightly with a rubber band.

Step 3: Add a few drops of each food coloring color onto the wipe in stripes, working across it like a rainbow.

Step 4: On a plate, mix 1 tablespoon of dish soap with 2 tablespoons of water using a spoon.

Step 5: Dip the wipe end of the bottle into the soapy mixture, then blow through the bottle's mouth. Watch a rainbow of bubbles pile up on the plate.

Learn more

This project works thanks to soap and surface tension, the invisible pull that makes water molecules stick together. Plain water pops too easily to hold a bubble shape, but dish soap breaks up that pull and lets it stretch into a thin, stretchy film instead. When you blow through the bottle, air pushes through the tiny holes in the wipe, and each pocket of air gets wrapped in that soapy film, so instead of one big bubble, you get a whole chain of tiny ones piling up together. Since the food coloring sits right on the wipe in stripes, each new bubble grabs a bit of color as it squeezes through, so the pile comes out looking like a rainbow.