Wonderful, Whimsical Water: a Rainbow Tutorial

You're never too young to learn about mixing the primary colors, and you're never too old to enjoy the process.

Since the goal of this project is to create a rainbow that you'll enjoy looking at, take some time when selecting the clear, glass containers that you will use. (It helps to have a kid around who collects every type of drink container known to man.) Otherwise, the supplies are really simple:

• 6 glass containers
• Water
• Liquid Food Colors (Paste is more difficult to mix.)
• Stirring tool (Just make sure it will fit in the mouth of each container. I used a slender, wooden skewer rather than a spoon.)

• Use only the PRIMARY colors from the food color set (red, yellow, blue). I know the set includes green, but don't use it. That would be cheating. During the process, each of the three SECONDARY (orange, green, violet) colors will be created by combining two of the PRIMARY colors.
• Fill the six containers with water.
• The first container only gets a few drops of red. Stir and move on.
• The second container gets drops of both red and yellow. Stir the orange water and move on.
• Continue in rainbow order: yellow, green, blue, violet. See the images above for specific information about mixing the remaining secondary colors.

To be honest, the desire to make a video is the whole reason that I went through this process. I loved how the colorful water looked when backlit, and adding the jazzy music seemed to complete the whole whimsical vibe I was going for. How will you mix your rainbow?