This project turned out to be even more fun and engaging than I had initially imagined, which always makes me totally geek out. I’m pretty sure my teenage helper on this particular day thought I had lost my marbles because I was so excited.

We began by filling regular balloons with water at the water table. (Do NOT get water balloons - they’re too thin and will break in your paint - DISASTER!) The kids had a dozen different ways to accomplish this task, and the experimentation was part of the fun. They also explored the idea of blowing air into the balloons after they had added some water. We really ended up with a broad variety of balloon sizes. They also all sounded different with varying amounts of water and air sloshing around in them. I hadn’t anticipated all of that awesome experimentation! (I’m geeking out again, aren’t I?)

My helper and I had to tie the balloons as they were filled to everyone’s satisfaction, but that was the only part the kids couldn’t do on their own.

After we had a whole bunch of balloons filled to various levels with water and air, we dumped some tempera paint on a bunch of paper plates. The kids held the balloons by the tied ends, dipped them in the paint, and threw them at a giant, flat piece of cardboard propped on a tree. The act of throwing them was super appealing to all of my hooligans, large and small!

And then, there was a whole part of this that I also didn’t anticipate - the popping of the balloons! Since we had intentionally not used water balloons, they didn’t break when we threw them at the cardboard, which was as I had intended. They were able to reuse them and redip them and throw them many times. That meant that in order to clean up, we had to pop them. It was surprisingly difficult since the balloons weren’t anywhere close to fully inflated. They were tough! The kids had a TOTAL BLAST trying a hundred ways to pop those suckers. They stomped on them, they threw them on the driveway, they poked them with sticks, they clapped them. Some of them worked alone and some together…this was the point at which my teenage friend probably thought I had lost it - I was out of my mind about all of the unintended experimentation and how this process art had totally turned the kids into scientists!!