Awesome Launcher

PREPARE TO LAUNCH**YOUR**AWESOME!

With this mini, DIY, catapult you can launch most anything: mini-marshmallows, raisins, tiny toys, peas, your awesomeness… whatever your awesome self desires. Ready? Get to it!

What you need:

~ A cap or other small cup-shaped something to be your launch pad

~ Glue (Elmer’s worked)

~ 6 or more popsicle sticks, tongue depressors, or craft sticks (personally I think this is a great excuse to eat 6 or more popsicles)

~ 4 rubber bands

~ Things to launch (your call!)

& one wacky catapult operator

What to do:

~ Glue your water bottle cap to one stick near the end. Let that dry. This will be your launch pad stick.

~ Stack 4 sticks up and rubber band them together – the blue rubber bands in my photo.

~ Take your launch pad stick and one last stick and sandwich them around the 4 stick stack (say that 10 times fast!). Use a rubber band to crisscross the two sticks and the stacked sticks – see green rubber band in picture. Improvise here, just get it fairly tight and keep this joint down hear the bottom of your two sticks to get best leverage.

~ Use your final rubber band to secure the launch pad stick and the base stick together – tan rubber band.

~ Ready… set… LAUNCH!!!!

Want more?

– What happens if you add more sticks to the stack?

– What happens with longer sticks? Shorter sticks? Plastic sticks?

– Does the weight of the thing you are launching matter?