Little Explorers: How To Make Giant Bubbles

Sunny, breezy conditions are perfect bubble weather! We decided to go large this week and make up a vat of enormous bubble mixture using a few extra secret ingredients.

This is so easy and really impressive! Who doesn’t love bubbles – at any age? Their swirling transparency and fragility makes them ever so special. Blowing, chasing and popping bubbles as they bounce off up into the sky is always a magical experience.

To make truly massive bubbles, you’ll need a couple more ingredients than just washing up liquid and water.

You will need:-

• 1 tablespoon of liquid glycerine
• 1 cup of cornflower
• 2 tablespoons of baking power
• 1 cup of washing up liquid
• 12 cups of warm water
• Garden string
• 2 drinking straws
• (*all cups are American size)

It has taken us a few tries to find the perfect recipe. You can source the more uncommon ingredients online or at a craft or baking shop.

Pour six cups of warmish water into a bucket and stir in one cup of cornflour, speedily and aggressively! It’s peculiar stuff and will solidify quickly unless you take charge! Now add the remaining 6 cups of water and 2 tablespoons of baking powder and continue mixing until it has all dissolved.

Next, gently add 1 cup of washing up liquid and 1 tablespoon of glycerin, mixing it up with a big spoon and trying not to make too many bubbles as you go.

We found that leaving the solution to rest at least overnight created the biggest bubbles. We left it in a cool place (the garage) to gather its thoughts. Now, if your Little Explorers are absolutely desperate to try it out, leave it for just two hours before you have a go and save some to test the next day. You could do an experiment to see if leaving the mixture longer makes the bubbles any bigger. We found some research that claims cold solution creates bigger bubbles than warm.

When ready, give it a gentle stir to shake up the cornflour that will have sunk to the green and gooey bottom of the bucket.

You’ll need a giant bubble wand too! It’s easy to make one by simply threading two straws onto a piece of garden string, which is then tied into a circle. Pull the two straws away from each other to create the loop and dip this carefully into the mix.

Doing this activity on a breezy day was a help for our Little Explorers because the wind dislodged the bubbles from the wand without having to skilfully blow it (invariably too hard!) Any which way you do it thought, it’s all part of the fun.

Just a quick tip – for best results, avoid the thinner own brand washing up liquids. It needs to be viscous to create strong bubbles!

Expert Explorers: Why are bees like bubbles? Here is a brilliant experiment for you. Find two sheets of clear plastic and soak them in bubble solution. Lie one sheet flat on the table. Build four pillars of Lego (about 3cm high) and put one on each corner of the sheet, then lie the second sheet evenly on top. Now blow bubbles into the space between. You’ll see them form perfect hexagons, just like a bee does when it builds a beehive. Bees and bubbles are both very efficient with their spaces and use the least material possible to create their walls!