Or How to Make Homemade Bubble Solution in 13 Easy Steps
Step 1: Set up a playdate for your child(ren).
Step 2: During the playdate, use up* all of the commercially produced bubble solution in the house.
Step 3: Promise your child(ren) that you will secure additional bubble solution for future use. Do not promise immediate bubble solution replacement as Steps 6 and 7 may be protracted.
Step 4: Search the web for homemade bubble solution recipes.
Step 5: Analyze the various formulations. Decide that you will make bubble solution using only water, dishwashing liquid, and glycerin.
Step 6: Call several local pharmacies and health food stores to inquire whether they stock liquid glycerin. Be prepared for the person on the other end of the line to say that they carry glycerin suppositories. Thank them nicely and move on.
Step 7: Finally locate the one pharmacy within reasonable driving distance which had a two ounce bottle of glycerin for sale. Secure a promise that they will guard it with their very lives hold it for you.
Step 8: Drive straight to the pharmacy to make your purchase.** Be very thankful that they really did have the stuff you wanted and that they did not try to sell you a jar of suppositories.
Step 9: Run at least one other errand on the way home so that you do not have to admit to the blog anyone that you drove ten miles out of your way just to buy one ingredient for homemade bubble solution.
Step 10: Review the various bubble solution recipes. Decide that you are going to put all of those years in pharmacy school to good use, execute a few quick calculations, and settle on a set of measurements.
Step 11: Compound your bubble solution.***
Step 12: Locate a bubble wand and test your solution.****
Step 13: Feel like MacGyver.
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* The phrase use up shall be liberally interpreted. Bubble solution is used up when it is (a) used to blow bubbles; (b) dripped onto hands; or (c) spilled onto clothing, shoes, and/or pavement of any variety, including but not limited to asphalt, concrete, patio pavers, and gravel.
** Do not break any speed limits: you are only going to use this stuff to make bubble solutions. There is nothing life-saving about this; although, having bubble solution on hot summer days may very well be sanity-preserving. But I digress.
*** Add the ingredients to the bubble container in this order: water, dishwashing liquid, glycerin. Be very careful not to agitate too strongly since you want a solution at the moment, not a counter full of bubbles.
**** If it is a rainy/cloudy/cold day, you probably ought to test your solution over the sink or in the bathtub. Just saying; because blowing bubbles inside will make your kitchen floor really slippery after a while.
Thursday, June 11, 2009
In which trek formulates
Posts
13 yarns:
You can test bubbles inside if you have carpet. :D
Wouldn't it have been cheaper to just buy the bubble solution?
I don't suppose it would be helpful to point out that you probably could have bought premade bubble solution at any of those pharmacies (or the grocery store, the dollar store, or the discount store)for about fifty cents a bottle, would it?
Darn. I have a 6 oz bottle of glycerin in the closet, languishing. It's from Michaels, in the cake decorating area. Weird, no?
I love my verification word and wish to add it to the English language immediately: ostootte.
If you add catnip tea to the solution, you can drive the felines utterly mad, too. That's always fun. (if you don't happen to be allergice to cats...maybe you should avoid that step.)
Making your own bubble stuff is great fun. I used to do that with the younger kids back when I taught elementary school. They think it is magic! You don't get that with the store-bought stuff.
Impressed that you found the glycerin...it can be a real challenge!
I'm also SUPER impressed that you spelled MacGyver correctly. I named one of my dogs MacGyver and sooooo many people get the spelling wrong!!
What? No pictures on this post?!!!
Yes - pictures would have been nice. Also disappointed that no duct tape was used. MacGyver would have used duct tape some how!
I hate to be the smart*ss but... why didn't you just buy more bubble stuff while you were at the store???
It may have been easier to buy bubble stuff but you get major cool points for making your own. I am a favorite in my daughter's circle because I make my own whipped cream. Sooo much better than the stuff in a can.
I buy bubble stuff for the cat. I'm impressed you even thought to make you own.
My dad (a science geek) always made homemade bubble solution and it was FAR superior to the junk you buy in the stores... especially if you want to use one of those giant bubblemakers they sell at specialty stores.
Hooray for having a successful MacGyver moment!
What do you do if your water is softened? Won't it produce better bubbles that way?
And Dawn is the detergent for bubbles and washing grease (we saw a live show of Ira Glass and he told a story of when he was a lowly NPR producer, he went with Spiffy Reporter to cover the Exxon Valdez oil spill, and the woman rescuing birds specifically insisted that she would only use Dawn to clean the birds. She was open to suggestions as to lots of things, but Dawn was non-negotiable. When they left, Ira Glass said to Spiffy Reporter, "Dawn dishwashing detergent?" and the reporter said yes, that was the soundbite they'd be using.)
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