Goldfish bowl

I can't take credit for this cute craft. I found it in our current issue (March 2009) of Family Fun magazine. It is ridiculously simple to make and a fantastic way to recycle some of those empty jars laying about the house. Well, maybe your house does not have an empty jar problem, but my collection is getting near embarrassing levels.




Materials:
small roundish glass jar with metal lid
paper clip
thread, in white
seed beads in colors of your choice
packing tape
super strong button magnets, about four but possibly more
colored paper
a fish pattern
glitter


First you'll need to find a good fish to trace from a book or just freehand it, nothing fancy is required. We found a great fish to trace in an aquarium book. Depending on the size of your jar your fish can be large or very small. The fish must be small enough to fit in the jar so it can look like it is swimming inside. My jars are rather small and that kept our fish tiny. Carefully cut out the fish and began to assemble the jar. Tie your tread on to the paper clip. Don't worry about length yet, set aside. Take your two pieces of fish and use a glue stick to glue them together. Slip the paper clip on the fish.

Place fish in bowl and eyeball the string length. Leave enough room to tape the end to the jar bottom with packing tape. Start by stacking four button magnets onto the underside of the lid, then screw it on and invert jar to allow paperclip to catch the magnetic field. Turn jar upright and watch your fish float. When the length of thread and number of magnets are adjusted correctly add the beads to cover the tape. The adjustment can take a few tries to get it set. Now you have your very own long lasting fish friend. If you want to be even more clever and have some fun you can make play fish food to go along with this new pet. I used some old spice jars and created a label.

How fun is that?