Lucky Beaded Rainbow

This pretty rainbow is so easy even little ones can make it. It’s perfect for teaching kids about colors and improving dexterity.

What you'll need:

• 1 brick of styrofoam
• 1 each purple, blue, green, yellow, orange and red chenille stems
• 15 purple pony beads
• 18 blue pony beads
• 23 green pony beads
• 27 yellow pony beads
• 32 orange pony beads
• 36 red pony beads
• Bag of cotton balls

How to make:

1. String pony beads onto chenille stems, matching the colors. (i.e. string green pony beads on green chenille, purple pony beads on purple chenille, etc)
2. Start with the purple beaded stem. Center the beads on the stem and trim the ends of the stem leaving about 2” on each end.
3. Find the center of the Styrofoam block and insert the two chenille ends into the brick, forming an arch (see photo below). Hint: use one of the pieces of chenille that you cut off to create the holes first, pull them out then insert the beaded chenille into the hole.
4. Repeat step 3 for each beaded stem, in the rainbow sequence (next is blue, green, yellow, orange, and red).
5. Glue cotton balls all around the bottom of the rainbow to form clouds. Cover the Styrofoam brick with cotton balls.
6. When cotton balls and glue are dry, stretch and gently pull the cotton balls to cover any exposed Styrofoam edges.

 Tips:

• If making several of these (i.e. class or preschool project), cut the bricks in half. This will give you twice the supplies as a full brick is not necessarily needed.
• Find large bags of pony beads in multicolored value packages at craft supply stores.
• Show small children the ends of the chenille stems so that they know there are pointy edges.

By: Amanda Formaro
http://crafts.kaboose.com/pony-bead-rainbow.html