“J” is for Jellyfish

I have been looking forward to getting to the letter "J" so we could try this cool jellyfish project I saw at "bhoomplay's blog"!  I knew my son would like learning about "J" because he loves to see the jellyfish at the aquarium, and as it turns out he also loves other "J" words that we learned about, like Jello and Jellybeans!

Materials:

clear plastic bag (mine is a produce bag from the grocery store)

plastic bottle

scissors

thread

food coloring

water

1.  Cut out one side of the plastic bag so you will have a flat rectangle.

2. Gather the center of the rectangle and tie the thread around it forming a bubble that is about 1.5" long.  Don't tie the thread too tightly because you will need to put a little water inside the bubble.

3. Cut off the bottom edge so that it is a good size for your jellyfish.

4. Cut strips to create the jellyfish tentacles.  I ended up cutting off some of the plastic because I didn't need that many tentacles.

Here's what it looked like after I cut all the strips:

5. Fill the bubble about half-full of water.  You might need to adjust the water/air ratio in the bubble to get the desired amount of flotation.

6.  Fill the bottle all the way up with water and stuff the jellyfish inside, then add some food coloring until the water is the color you want!

7.  Screw the lid on tightly; you might even want to use a dab of glue on the lid to prevent spills!

Now you can play with your new pet jellyfish!  It's fun to turn the bottle up-side down and watch the jellyfish rise to the top!

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