I Spy Bottles with Sight Words

I came across some more Fiji water bottles in my cabinet today and it reminded me I need to start working on some more I Spy Bottles! My goal was to make thematic ones this past summer, with colored rice to match the holiday/season. Ha! That idea was quickly gone once September came around. But the kids have enjoyed using the ones I have in the Word Work center this year.

 The pic below shows one bottle of a set of three I made. Inside the bottle are small items and little strips of sight words printed on cardstock {and laminated for durability}. I searched all of the junk drawers and the kids' toys for little things - anything- that would fit in those little bottles. The Dollar Tree was also a good place to find stuff. Pennies, Nickels, Dimes, toothpicks, silly bands, birthday candles, paper clips, little frogs, plastic rings, old keys.....etc. I also bought some sequins to add some extra color.

FYI- when you make your bottles don't forget to write down what's in each bottle BEFORE adding the rice. I learned that the hard way and those little things don't come out of the bottle as easy as they went in. :-) Add the rice last and leave some room for shaking the items. You'll have to play around with this to decide what you think would work best for your bottle.

Once you have your bottles like you want them I'd suggest hot-gluing the cap on. I added some ribbon just to fancy it up a bit. I used numbers on the lid so I'd know which bottle went with the correct I Spy Sheet.

To dye the rice I found a few ideas online and pretty much combined some of those ideas .

You'll need:

~ a large bag of rice {I bought a 5 lb. bag and used what I needed}

~rubbing alcohol {a few tablespoons}

~liquid food coloring {@10-12 drops depending on the color you want}

~disposable bowls and spoons {unless you don't mind the dye getting on them}

What I did:

~put alcohol in bowls, then add drops of food coloring

~add rice until it's coated well {I didn't measure the rice, but there wasn't any liquid left in the bowl}

~pour the rice onto aluminum foil or waxed paper and spread out to dry {if you pour out liquid, I would suggest adding more rice to soak it up}

~ store in a container {obviously dyed rice isn't for eating, so please don't eat it}

This recipe for dyed rice seemed to work well for me. There may be others out there, but this made some very colorful rice. Looked so pretty spread out on the counter and worked just fine for the I Spy Bottles.

Good luck if you decide to make your own. Start saving those water bottles!