Ak first discovered these water beads. She had used them in her classroom before and recently spotted them in stores. Please see her original post on them.
A water bead is a water-retaining polymer. You can learn more about them here. www.waterbeads.net I decided to do a search on Polymers instead of water beads and had a much better result. For those of you still having a hard time finding them, I think that would be a better search for you.
Not only are these fun to play with just on their own but we’ve been having a TON of fun with them on the light box. :-)RL
Wow!
Put them on a light table for a whole new perspective!
After doing a search on Polymers I found these “Block polymers” from no other than my favorite store…. Discount School Supply. LOVE them! I added them to our products we love which you can see here.
They didn’t quite take block form yet. We just got them today and I told my daughter she could play with them before she went to bed. Will update tomorrow after they “grow” a little more.
Rebekah says:
Hello! I found your blog through “Not Just Cute”. I am a preschool teacher in Georgia. You can get these beads at Michaels.
Thanks for the great idea! I am going to try this soon!
Mercedi says:
I tried the beads tonight (after letting them soak over night). They were a hit! But one word of advice, get the small beads, the 1/2 inch beads. NOT the large, 1 inch beads. The large beads broke and made a HUGE mess! The kids would get fragments on their hands and would want to wash them then play for a second and want to wash again. So stick with the small beads, they hardly broke.
Regardless, thanks for the idea!
Mary says:
I absolutely love your blog! It has been so helpful and given me so many ideas of activities to do with my 14-month-old son. We tried water beads for the first time today and he spent 20 minutes (!) playing with them! I was shocked since most of the activities he does are usually given up after 10 minutes. He spent most of the time splashing and squishing and a good amount of time putting them into bowls and then dumping them back into the big container.
Thank you, again, for your amazing blog!
Maz says:
I love this idea and recently but some but they kept breaking up, so I have been too worried to try them with my pre-schoolers. Does the quality differ do you know. I bought them from the internet.
Unknown says:
The link to your products you love is broken – no posts with label Supplies. Is there another page where your supplies are located? I’d love to check out your list.
Play At Home Mom says:
Sorry… this is a really old post. I noticed a lot of the pictures are not working either. I fixed the products we love link. If you look on the left tool bar you will also see our Amazon Store as well.
Lisa says:
These are sold on Ebay as something for putting flowers and plants in. You can just search for “water beads” and you’ll get a bunch of results. Most are shipped from China but they are really cheap.
lemon twigs says:
I got mine from Dollar Tree. I think my husband loves them more than the kids do! So much fun!
Amanda says:
Where is your lightbox from?
Play At Home Mom says:
constructive playthings
Necie says:
Water beads stain clothes. My twins came home from school with colors on their new white shirts. I tried several stain removers and they are still stained. I might try bleach, but the shirts have a design of silver and rhinestones. the label says “no bleach”… any ideas?