DIY I Spy Jar for Kids

Today the boys and I made the funnest, cheapest craft and they LOVE it! It’s kept them busy for hours and I couldn’t have found anything easier! What do you need? Let me show you.

First you’re going to want to start with a clear container. We used a mason jar because we had one at home. You can also use a clear water bottle or a plastic container. Whatever you use  is up to you, you just want to make sure that your littles are going to be able to see inside!

The next thing that you’re going to need is rice.

Do you need this much rice? Absolutely not
Did we open this bag from the bottom so it’s upside down for this photo? Yes.

You’re only going to need about 3 cups of rice max depending on what else you are going to put into your jar.

Here are a few of the things that we put into ours.

Most of the things that we used were regular household items! A clothes pin, a dime, a bobby pin, paperclip and buttons. The other items are things that I purchased from Hobby Lobby for about $1.99 per bag of small little items. We got a dice, little animals, cupcakes and bells. The leftovers will be used for some other project that I come up with in the future so I’m not opposed to buying in bulk even if I only need 1.

The next thing that you’re going to want to do is pour some rice into your container, and then place a few items in. Pour some rice into the container and place a few items in. Of course it’s going to get mixed up, but it’s nice to have things spread out through the rice. You also don’t want to fill it so full that your child won’t be able to shake it around looking for the items.

When you’re finished you’re going to want to glue the lid down, because if your kids are anything like mine I would have rice in my carpet within 5 minutes of leaving them alone with it.

Your finished jar will look similar to this. We also used green paper in the top because we couldn’t find the middle part of our jar. It works just as well and my son thinks it’s because green is his favorite color so it worked out great!

I made a list of the items that we put in our jar for my boys to find that goes with the jar. You could obviously type yours if you want it to look nicer but my boys were not patient enough to wait! They now go item by item looking for each of them in the rice. Even from the other room I can currently hear the rice bouncing around in the jar.

Have fun making yours! We probably spent $6.00 max on this project and it’s now one of our favorites! I’d love to see yours when you finish and I can post them to my blog site!