Awesome Egg Exoskeleton

This is one of those wondrous wactivities that has a lil something for everyone. Like crafts? Gotcha. Love to make a mess? This is for you! Into cool, controlled implosions? Sign on up!

What you need:

~ Balloons (even tiny water balloons will work)

~ Water, flour, and a whisk

~ A shallow dish, like a cake pan

~ Yarn & Scissors

~ Wax paper

OPTIONAL: tiny toys or little goodies

And, of course, one wacky activity doer!

What to do:

~ Spread out the wax paper to keep your work table clean (or as clean as possible, this is about to get MESSY!)

~ Whisk up one cup of flour with 3/4 cup water in a shallow dish. Add water as needed until you get a mix about the consistency of good ole Elmer’s School Glue.

~ Cut long lengths of that yarn. (We did 2-3 feet worth, but don’t worry about being precise, you can always use a second or third piece on a balloon, as needed.)

~ Blow up your balloons to whatever size you want. We kept ’em small and moulded them a bit to be more egg shaped, but you do what works for you. No wrong way to do this! OPTIONAL: if you want to trap goodies inside your exoskeletons, put the toys or cubes or whatever in before you blow the balloon up!

~ Soak one piece of yarn at a time (to avoid tangles) in your flour/water goo.

~ Once it’s good and soaked, wrap the yarn around the balloon, wiping some of the goo off the yarn as you go. Make awesome web-ish patterns (remembering that if you are trapping something you need to be sure none of the inter-string holes are too big.

~ Set aside to dry.

~ Repeat the process for all of your balloons.

Let them dry overnight, remembering to turn them after a few hours to let all the parts dry all the way.

~ When they are totally dry, take those scissors and snip the balloon carefully (don’t cut your yarn web!). Watch the balloon pull away in a cool, slow-mo implosion!

~ Sneak the deflated balloon out one of those handy holes and, voila! You have a cool egg exoskeleton!! If you make a bunch, you have a cool, spring center piece!

Note: there are lots of ways to do this and you can see where we got our ideas and inspiration on the Wactivity Pinterest page!