Looking for a fun backyard activity for the kids or the family this winter? Build some COLOURED ICE SCULPTURES IN THE SNOW. It’s a great activity for all ages, and so easy to prepare!
Of all of the fun and cool activities we’ve done in the snow, I think this might be my favourite so far.
Now, we’ve played with coloured ice lots of times, and the kids always enjoy it. You can find all of our coloured ice activities here. We’ve even played with coloured ice cubes in the snow before, but THIS… actually building a large structure with a variety of colourful ice cubes and blocks… this was new for us.
My daycare kids are toddlers and preschoolers, and they loved this activity, but older kids and grownups will love making these structures too.
This would be a great backyard winter activity to do as a family on the weekend, or at your school or neighbourhood winter carnival.
I’ve always wanted to make coloured ice sculptures with my daycare kids, but I never quite knew how we would get the ice cubes to stick together.
Then a friend in Ottawa shared photos of her boys participating in some Winterlude activities, and they were building some awesome structures with coloured blocks of ice.
When I asked her how it was done, I learned that the secret ingredient is a bottle of water.
Let me tell you how it’s done.
How To Make Coloured Ice Sculptures In The Snow
Supplies:
- Water
- Food Colouring (Amazon Affiliate Link)
- Ice Cube Trays and Plastic Containers
- Water Bottle
Preparing the coloured ice:
Gather up your ice cube trays and small food containers and storage containers.
I have quite a few of them, and over the course of 2 days, I used them all several times, and made a ton of ice.
I filled up all of the ice cube trays trays and containers with coloured water, and then put some of them in our freezers, and some outside in the sub-zero weather overnight. Once frozen, I transferred all of the coloured ice to a large bin in the chest freezer, and repeat the process.
Over the course of a couple of days, I made a whole basin of coloured ice to make our structures with.
In fact, after making our ice sculptures today, I still have enough to do it again another day. In the photo below, you’ll see about half of my stash.
Don’t over-do it with the colour!
I coloured my ice with these Neon colours by McCormick, but you can use whatever brand you have on hand.
GO EASY on the colour though!
For my first round of ice, I put one drop in every ice cube compartment, but I didn’t like how dark the colours were. We used them, but for the next batches that I made, I mixed a jug of water with 5 or 6 drops of colour in it, and I poured that entire jug into a couple of ice cube trays.
Much better.
The best weather conditions:
Once you’ve made enough ice, you just need to wait for a nice, COLD day! You want it to be BELOW zero (celcius) or below 32ºF for your ice sculptures to work.
The secret ingredient:
A bottle of water is the secret to creating great ice sculptures in your own back yard.
I can’t believe I hadn’t thought of it before! Here’s how it works:
Count to ten!
Every time you add an ice cube to your structure, dribble a bit of water from the water bottle over the ice cubes, and have the children count to ten.
The water freezes quite quickly upon contact with the ice, and while the children are counting, it forms a “glue” that holds the cubes together!
Simple science at its finest.
Our outside temperature was hovering right around zero today, so some of our coloured ice cubes took longer than 10 seconds to freeze into place.
The colder it is, the quicker your water will freeze, and the more sturdy your structure will be.
This was a great start for us today though.
The colours are gorgeous, and the ice shapes look good enough to eat!
I love that we have this burst of colour, and something so interesting to look against the white backdrop of snow in our backyard.
I’m hoping for temperatures to dip a little more so we can get back out there to make some new sculptures and to add to our existing one.
Check out our snow painting activity and our diamond dig snow sensory bin!
Jackie is a mom, wife, home daycare provider, and the creative spirit behind Happy Hooligans. She specializes in kids’ crafts and activities, easy recipes, and parenting. She began blogging in 2011, and today, Happy Hooligans inspires more than 2 million parents, caregivers and Early Years Professionals all over the globe.
