Hey kids, tired of empty plastic bottles? Let’s make an interesting game for your leisure time. This fun bottle activity is quite simple, but by making it in a complicated design you can enjoy it even more. Today’s craft will give you an idea of how you can play around with empty plastic bottles, create complicated designs and see the magic of small balls or bottle caps making their way through these bottles.

Things you need:

1. Empty plastic bottles (at least six)

2. A cardboard piece (you can flatten any cardboard box)

3. Marker or water colours

4. Scissors or paper cutter

5. White glue or hot glue

Directions:

1. Mark the empty bottles on both sides such as two inches below the mouth, then draw an oval shape (two-inches wide and three inches long) one inch above the bottom, see picture 2.

2. Carefully cut the marked parts, the top and the bottom, pictures 3 and 4.

3. Repeat on all six bottles, picture 5.

4. To cover the sharp edges of the bottle, carefully tape inside out. The tape is not visible in the picture, but it has been pasted at the edges, picture 6.

5. Using water colours or markers, colour the edges which have been taped now so that they remain visible from a distance, picture 7.

6. Place the bottles on the cardboard, ideally, the hollow oval part of the bottle should face upward and the wide-open mouth side of the bottle to face downward in diagonal shape, see picture 8.

7. Glue the bottles the way you placed them. Repeat the step on another bottle, but now by flipping the side, the oval hollow of the second bottle should face upward towards the mouth of the first bottle in a diagonal shape.

The idea is when you put a ball or the bottle cap from the first opening on the top bottle it will go straight to the second and to the third in a zigzag way. Isn’t it interesting?

8. Repeat the steps until you reach the end.

9. There are two ways to give an end to the activity, first either by cutting the top that is the mouth side and pasting the bottom part of any other empty bottle there, then cutting out the middle part. While the second, which is easy, is to use the bottle as it is, just cut from the middle so that the balls or the caps get collected at one place, pictures 9 and 10. (I did it the first way).

The bottle activity is ready, you can paste it on any wall or the door of your cupboard and see the balls or the bottle caps making their way in the bottles, enjoy!

Published in Dawn, Young World, October 17th, 2020