DIY sensory bottles with baby oil are easy to make yet somehow tricky to get right! Learn from my experience and create the perfect calm bottles for your kids.
What are Sensory Bottles?
Sensory or calm down bottles are bottles or jars that have glitter and other items that can float in the jar. These items or particles tend to mesmerize people owing to their slow descent in the water. When you shake the bottle and keep it upside down, the glitter particles in the water start moving and they make an engaging view for the kids. Not just kids, even adults enjoy these easy DIY sensory bottles with baby oil. There are many ingredients with which you can make sensory bottles, oil, and water being the primary ones. However, people even DIY calm down bottles with just water and glitter.
Why is it so popular?
It’s no surprise that these bottles are on a rage these days. This is because of their calming properties that can relax even a crying baby! Having said that, the slow movement of the glitters relaxes the breath of anyone who’s watching it. It becomes even more effective when you combine multiple colors and sizes of glitter to the jar. You can even use water beads to increase it’s fun!
DIY Sensory Bottles with Baby Oil
Following its fame, I also tried to make DIY sensory bottles with baby oil. But unlike everyone, I’ll be honest with you and share my exact experience, which I must say, was agitating. I did fail in DIYing the bottle the first time, but as I experimented with the ingredients, I was able to DIY a sensory bottle. It’s not one of the greatest sensory bottles that you’ll witness, but it’s one that became successful after quite a few tries! First, let me tell you what I actually did the first time that ruined the bottle.
Ingredients
- Water – Half of the Bottle
- Vegetable Glycerine – 5 tbsp
- Baby Oil – 2 Cups
- Glitter
- Food Color
- A Spare Bottle
What I Did
I filled the bottle half-way up with water and added my glitters into it. I took two colors in glitter, you can take as many as you like. Next up, I added a bit of orange food color to my bottle and gave it a shake. Then I added 5 tbsp of vegetable glycerine and filled the bottle with baby oil just below an inch from the top. Now, you must shake the bottle really well to get the action started.
Where It Got Wrong
From my experience, I noticed a few things that might have gone wrong. First, I probably added too much vegetable glycerine or I chose the wrong type of glitter. Because the glitters were lumped up and that is not how it should turn out. Maybe, using large glitter particles will help, but then I noticed that it wasn’t the glitters, it was either the vegetable glycerine or the baby oil itself.
What I Did to Correct it?
Once I figured out the problem, I knew what I had to do. I tried to do all of it again but with a change in the measurements. I used only 1/2 tbsp vegetable glycerin and only 2-3 tbsp baby oil. Next, I filled up the bottle with water and added the rest of the ingredients in the same order. And it worked, the glitter was moving around in the bottle, unlike earlier and there were no lumps. However, one can’t see the glitter from a distance because I chose the wrong size. If you were to use glitters, I will suggest you use large sizes and a little heavy.
Learn from My Experience:
Note: Please watch the video at HD quality as I used small glitters and they might not be visible in lower video quality.
- Use a little amount of vegetable glycerine as the more you add glycerine, the more it will slow down the movement in the bottle.
- Glycerine might as well create lumps of glitter.
- My glitter was lightweight and so it got collected near the oil at the top.
- Use heavyweight and bigger glitters and other embellishments for your DIY sensory bottles with baby oil.
- You can even use oil-based colors to make a color-block sensory bottle.
- Use colorful glitters that will show up in the colors that you are going to add to the water and oil.
- You can seal the bottle cap with a hot glue gun to avoid spillage.
- If you’re using light-colored glitters, make sure that the water is on the dark side and vice versa.
Takeaway
Your sensory bottle will turn out pretty good if you keep the measurements right. Just keep in mind that vegetable glycerine will slow down the movement in your bottle, which can be good and even bad. It should be a judgment call on how much to use depending on the size of your container.
