How to dye pasta for play

Today I decided to dye some pasta for Thomas so that he can play stringing games and such with it!  This is so simple to do and all you need are a few things that  you more than likely have kicking about the house anyway!


You will need:
Pasta shapes
Selection of food colourings
Vinegar
Pots

You simply mix your food colouring, I used about 2 teaspoons worth per 15 pasta tubes, with a tablespoon of vinegar.  Then you add the pasta, leave it for a few minutes and hey presto fun coloured pasta for playing with!  You will need to leave the pasta to dry out overnight but it doesn't go soft or soggy.

I had red, blue and green food colouring by Dr Oetker and although the red and blue dyes took within minutes I had to leave the green one for about half an hour and even then it isn't as vibrant as the other 2 colours.  I used 15 tubes of each as I suspect these will get crushed, lost or eaten within days but I plan to add 15 plain pasta tubes as well as a yellow option!

I also choose to use pasta tubes so that we can play different games with them, such as stringing, putting them into a clear tub to act as a colourful musical instrument or sticking onto a picture.

Have you made any cheap and easy DIY games for your children?

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