Life.Love.Craft: Glitter String Snowballs

Happy Monday to you all! I want to take a minute here for my "holy smokes my baby is almost a year old!" moment this week. Seriously, where has the last twelve months gone?

Today I want to share another fun craft that I did for Braxton's upcoming first birthday. But this could easily be a fun craft you could do for Christmas decorations or even just because it's winter. They are pretty snowballs that don't melt!

These are easy but a messy craft, so make sure that you won't need to use your hands for anything important (read, start your show before you start the craft).

The supplies are pretty simple:

You will need:
Water balloons
String (I used thin white yarn)
Scissors
Water
Glue
Glitter
Bowl (for water) & plate (for glitter)

First, you will want to blow your water balloons up to about the size of a kiwi. Or, if you're like me, have your husband do it because you just.cannot.blow.the.darn.things.up. It was embarrassing people.

After you blow up your balloons, you will want to tie the string around the balloon tie:

Next, wrap the string around the balloon. Go crazy and try to cover the whole balloon, gaps are not your friends. I didn't cut any portion of string off, I just left it in the bundle. It helps to not worry about how much string you have left.

Now once you are happy with how the balloon is covered, cut your string. Give yourself a little bit extra:

You can use this little extra piece to tuck the string in:

Now comes the messy part. Word of advice, get all of your balloons ready before you take it any further. You will want to mix the water and the glue in a 2-1 mixture. Stir it really, really well and let it sit for a few minutes:

Next, dip those suckers in there! Try to cover all of the string, but don't drown it either. The wetter the string is, the longer it will take to dry and I found that the glitter did not stick as well:

I don't have any pictures of the glitter step, as my hands were covered in glue and glitter. But just hold your balloon over your plate, keeping one hand dry (of the glue mixture) to sprinkle the glitter. Turn it all around to cover everything. Try to avoid big clumps as well, as they will probably just fall off once you pop the balloons.

You will want to let them dry for at least 48 hours to allow the balloons to separate from the string. I left mine to dry on wax paper. Remember, you do not want to dry them on anything that they can stick to.

After the 48 hours, pop the balloons and let them separate from the string. You can help them along if needed. What you are left with are pretty snowballs that you can enjoy without worrying about puddles.