Make Your Own Kinetic Sand (10 lbs for 50 cents!)
My daughter wanted Kinetic Sand for Christmas this year, but the prices are so high! Even moon sand is expensive, and the glow sand is even more!
UPDATE: We added a video showing how to make kinetic sand! (scroll down) And, we also blogged another post showing how to make COLORED Kinetic Sand! Don’t miss it!
We found a way to make it easy and cheap. You can make a little or a lot. Make 10 pounds for 50 cents!! Even making 50+ pounds will only cost you about $4!! You can’t beat that!
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If you happen to have a sandbox (or a beach nearby!), scoop up a little sand and make up a batch of Homemade Kinetic Sand for little or no cost. The idea of FREE Kinetic Sand sounds great to me! If not, you can buy it at home improvement stores.
Price Breakdown:
For example, 2.2 pounds of Kinetic Sand on Amazon costs about $17. At local stores near me, such as Michael’s, it’s more than that. Plus, figure that we’re making 10 lbs and 50 lbs in the recipes below. Not that you would buy 50 lbs at that rate, but 2 lbs? Come on, that’s not much sand!! 5 cups is 10 lbs, so 2 lbs is a cup? A cup of sand?? If you bought 10 lbs on Amazon (and technically you’d need 5 packages, so it would be 11 lbs), it’d run you about $85. If you bought 50 lbs (or 50.6 lbs because you’d need 23 packages), you’d pay a whopping $391. Not exactly a bargain.
In our “Make a little…” recipe below, we’re making 10 pounds – nearly 5 times as much as the package in store. If we have sand already, it’s basically free. If you don’t have sand available, you can buy a 50 pound bag for $2.47. If you make the small batch, you’re using 1/5 of it – for total cost of a mere 50 cents for 10 lbs of Kinetic sand. Compare that to 10 lbs of the prepackaged at $85. $0.50 versus $85.00 – this is a no brainer.
So, you can see why I’m excited! 🙂
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Don’t miss our feature on how to make this kinetic sand COLORFUL!!
Make a little…
INGREDIENTS
- 5 cups sand (approx. 10 lbs) ~ free or nearly free, if you have it
- 1.2 cups corn starch (approx. 1 cup + 3 tablespoons)
- 1/2 teaspoon dish soap (e.g. Dawn Dishwashing Liquid)
- water (about 1 cup)
- optional: 1 teaspoon Tea Tree Oil (for antibacterial properties)
Because play sand is an outdoor thing (it’s sand, after all), you might consider adding the tea tree oil to clean it up a little. After several months, ours is still fresh and smells okay. But, we’ve heard from some people who said when making the Moon Sand 2.0 after a few weeks, it stinks. Tea Tree oil should do the trick!
DIRECTIONS
- Put sand in a container
- Add corn starch and mix thoroughly
- Mix water & dish soap, then add to sand
- Mix thoroughly and enjoy!!
Store in a covered container.
NOTE: adjust water depending on how wet your sand is, since this varies a LOT it’s impossible to tell you exactly how much you’ll need. I used 6 cups total in the BIG 50 pound recipe below and had to let it dry a little, which is fine to do. Don’t dump in 6 cups to start because your plain sand may be more wet than mine was. Where I bought it, they store the sand outside and it’s damp. The amount of moisture in your sand will make a big difference in how this turns out. But, if it gets more wet than you want, it’s fine just leave the top off of container and it will dry. You can store it in a sealed container. After 3 months ours did not smell and was not dry. But, if yours gets dry you can add water to it.
Make a lot…
INGREDIENTS:
- 50 lb. bag of QuickKrete Play Sand, $2.47 at Home Depot
(approx 25 cups = 50 lbs) - 6 Cups of corn starch
- 1 Tablespoon dish soap (e.g. Dawn Dishwashing Liquid)
- Water (start with 3 cups, add more as needed – 1 cup at a time)
- optional: approx 1 tablespoon Tea Tree Oil (for antibacterial properties)
Because play sand is an outdoor thing (it’s sand, after all), you might consider adding the tea tree oil to clean it up a little. After several months, ours is still fresh and smells okay. But, we’ve heard from some people who said when making the Moon Sand 2.0 after a few weeks, it stinks. Tea Tree oil should do the trick!
NOTE: adjust water depending on how wet your sand is, since this varies a LOT it’s impossible to tell you exactly how much you’ll need. I used 6 cups total for the 50 pound recipe and had to let it dry a little, which is fine to do. Don’t dump in 6 cups to start because your plain sand may be more wet than mine was. Where I bought it, they store the sand outside and it’s damp. The amount of moisture in your sand will make a big difference in how this turns out. But, if it gets more wet than you want, it’s fine just leave the top off of container and it will dry. You can store it in a sealed container. After 3 months ours did not smell and was not dry. But, if yours does get dry you can add water to it.
DIRECTIONS
- Put sand in a big container (plastic tubs with lids work great!)
- Add corn starch and mix thoroughly using your hands or a shovel
- Mix water & dish soap, then add to sand
- Mix thoroughly and enjoy!!
NEW: Here’s an Instructional Video of how we made it!
Other Recipe Ideas from around the Internets
We found this quick and easy guide (pictured below), but have heard some warnings. Especially Moon Sand 2.0 which apparently stinks terribly after a few hours!! Let us know in comments if you’ve had good luck or bad results with a specific recipe.