MagicBeadz - Crystal Jelly Beads Grow in Water - Fun for All Ages

I got this for my daughters birthday. I wanted to fill a small pool with them so she could “swim” in them. Or at least be able to cover her legs. I used the whole jar. The jar is small but the beads are small until they absorb the water. So what I did was put the whole jar of beads into a 20 gallon tote. I added about 5 gallons of water. We were busy with birthday things so they ended up soaking for about 5 hours.(The package says 2-4 hours) The beads had absorbed most of the water and filled the tote about 1/4 to 1/3 of the way. We used a strainer to take off the excess water.(there wasn’t much left) We had a 2 ring baby pool that was 4 feet wide. There was enough beads to just barely cover the bottom of the pool.The beads were bouncy and squishy and all very uniform. They held up very well. My kids had a lot of fun with them. With kids rolling around and playing in the pool with the beads we did end up with a smashed ones but that is to be expected when they are used the way we did. The kids sat on them. The kids did find about 6 odd shaped ones while they were playing. They made it a game and saved them because they were “cool”.Over all they worked Great. I would use them outside or inside but maybe the kitchen or bathroom. I think it would suck if these got smushed in the carpet. They are VERY bouncy. I would just call them mini bouncy balls, but bouncier… I am still finding get away beads around the house. If I were to do this again for the size of pool we had, I would get one more jar of the beads. My daughter is 12 so I think that would be plenty to fill the pool a bit more and still give her room without having a bunch spill out as she is playing. 3 jars might be too many.It has been 3 days and we are still trying to dry them out. It is still cold enough to snow here so drying them in the sun outside is kind of hard. We put them all back in the tote the 1st night because my daughter still wanted to mess with them. The next day we put a fan over the top of the tote and let it go for that day and most of the night. They did not shrink much so the past 2 days we have had them on a mesh drying rack I have for clothes. It has a fan connected to it. I covered the mesh with paper towels so that the beads would not fall though after they were back down to size. I shut it off at night and turn it on in the morning, but some of the beads are back down to their original size. I knew going in shrinking them back down would be the hard part so I am not surprised at this.Photos that I hope are in order :) : 1. Tote and jar 2. Dry beads in tote. 3. Dry beads in hand 4. Dry bead next to full bead 5. Same as 4 6. Beads and water 7.Beads after a 5-10 minutes soak 8. Beads after about a 2 hours soak 9. Beads in tote after 5 hours10. Beads in pool11. Fully formed beads in hand12. One of the odd shaped beads

When these first arrived, my thought was "I paid $20 for this?!?" The beads are BB sized and grow to small marble sized. The container is tiny, so 20000 didn't seem logical for such a small container. I grabbed a few out and put them in some water and a few hours later let my 3 year old toss them around in the empty bathtub. He had a ball! They were fun and bounced around like you wouldn't believe! I quickly changed by view of these not being worth the price as they are fun. They are durable but can and do break. We toss them in the garden when they do & they serve a new purpose of aiding in plant root health. Well worth the price

I bought two packages of these (based on reviews) to fill a kiddie pool for my 2.5 year old. He had a great time playing in the pool with the beads, and I had a hoot watching his joy. The big downside-- the clean up! I left the beads in the pool for a week with a little bit of water (perhaps mistake #1, but where the H are you supposed to put 40K mushy beads/balls??!!). The mixture had turned a bit gelatinous throughout by the time I scooped out beads and put them in a cooler that I cold then drain, but the beads were small enough that they ran out the cooler drain when opened. Then I dumped a bunch onto a large towel so that the water could drain while the beads would remain and (hopefully) shrink so that I could store and use them again. That never happened! Maybe they were just too water logged. I ended up throwing out a very gooey mess, and feeling like I spent too much money for one afternoon of fun. So maybe don't fill up a kiddie pool folks, these are likely much easier to manage on a smaller scale!

These were a total hit for my 3 year olds birthday party. The adults and big kids loved them too. The day of the party was a little chilly so we put them in the water table for the kids instead of water. I had used two jars which was too many for the water table but would have been great for the kiddie pool. They are definitely messy, slippery and crush underfoot but they don't stain and were easily swept up and off the deck. They have also rehydrated after it rained so we continued to play with them in the water table. Very cool.

These are really cool. You need to just buy them yourself. I don't feel like I'm wasting anything because the ones I've allowed to absorb water have almost all been used to put water back into my houseplants :)Super Cool Feeling ~ Relaxing ~ Fun !!!Not Really Messy ... They Do Go Bouncing All Around Though :)Have Had Some In A Little Air Tight Container On My Window Sill Since Christmas As Decoration???I Find Ways To Use All Types Of Things As Decor As Well As Whatever Other Purposes :)