Juggling mystifies kids and is a core skill everyone should learn. Apart from improving hand-eye co-ordination, it develops focus and literally helps your brain learn to juggle multiple tasks. It’s a great way to spend time with the kids as well and best of all, it’s practically free.
To get started with your juggling, all you need is a few soft balls or beanbags. If you’ve never learned to juggle, the most important thing in a “practice” juggling ball is that it can’t roll away. You don’t want to spend all your juggling time searching under the couch or chasing balls down the driveway. If you don’t have a soft ball or beanbag, no problem. You can make your own juggling balls. Here’s a quick and easy way.
You will need: few balloons, rice, a small plastic bottle (a soft drink bottle will do), and a funnel
Directions:
- Measure out a predetermined quantity of rice and pour it into the plastic bottle using the funnel. Note that the quantity of rice will determine the size of the ball, so if you have small children, you may want to make smaller balls that can fit in their hands. Generally, you can use about half a cup of rice per ball.
Tip:
If you don’t have rice available, you can also use flour or sand. - Take one of the balloons and inflate it till it is about the size of a tennis ball. Twist the stem of the balloon and place it over the mouth of the rice-filled bottle.
- Invert the bottle so that all of the rice is transferred to the attached balloon. Once this is done, remove the balloon from the mouth of the bottle and let the balloon deflate.
- If the neck of the balloon is very long, cut it off. Ensure that you do not cut off the part containing the rice.
- Take another balloon and cut off its neck. Use this balloon to cover the rice-filled balloon.
- Your juggling ball is ready. To make the ball look more attractive, use one or more different-colored balloons to cover the one filled with rice. To produce a striped effect, cut both the neck and base off a balloon and then slide it over the rice-filled balloon.
This is just one of many ways to make juggling balls, but it is one that doesn’t involve sewing.