If you’re like me and you have a child who counts down the days until it’s time for the Elf to reappear, then you might also be like me in stressing out a teensy bit about how much time and effort you’re going to have to put into creating mischief for the elf yet again this year. I’ll be the first to admit that I can be a little bit last minute when it comes to planning out elf activities.  But this Elf on the Shelf Skittles Rainbow Magic activity is really simple and it went down an absolute storm the first time we did it.

We first tried out the Elf on the Shelf Skittles Rainbow Magic just before Christmas last year. I’d seen it done on TV and thought what a simple yet really fun activity it was. And so I decided it would be a good one to delegate to our elf.

If you don’t already have your Elf on the Shelf and you’re going to give it a whirl this year, then this is the one we have.

There is a huge choice of elves out there, but this one with the book is lovely and as he’s likely to reappear year after year for at least the next 7 years in our house, then I think this one is a good investment.

So what is Elf on the Shelf Skittles Rainbow Magic?

We all know that most of our elves love to get up to a little bit of mischief whilst they’re visiting us in December. But I like the mischief to be less naughty and more fun for the children.

The Elf on the Shelf Skittles Rainbow Magic activity is a really lovely one for the children to wake up to. The first time we did it we actually got audible “oooooohs” from our eldest. He was particularly hard to impress at the time so this was great!

The idea is, you arrange the different coloured skittles around the edge of a plate. The plate needs to have a raised rim all around the edge for this to work. I found that the rainbow worked best when I arranged the skittles in pairs, so two green, two orange and so on.

Our elf did this bit for us last year! Read all the way down to see how he ramped this up this year though so the kids had even more fun!

Last year, our elf (Eddie) wrote a little note for the children explaining what they needed to do. They had no clue at this point what the end result would be. Eddie wrote:

Hi kids,

Just add warm water & watch the magic!

Love,

Eddie x

Simple, yet effective!

You then pour a small amount of WARM water into the middle of the plate. You need to do this slowly so that you don’t end up with a plate full of swimming skittles! You should pour the water so that it reaches about half way up the skittles.

Sit back, watch and wait!

The colours from the skittles will slowly start to work their way towards the middle of the plate, forming a beautiful rainbow effect.

This was such a cheap experiment, Elf on the Shelf Rainbow Magic is a great, fun activity to do on a budget. My children range from 3 up to 12 years old and I know they’ll get just as much fun from it this time round as they did when we first tried it.

This year, Eddie was joined by his friend Buddie and added a little twist to the rainbow magic!

Do you have any good, cheap Elf on the Shelf activity ideas?

Elf on the Shelf magic can be loved by children and will be quite a hit among kids who love elves. If you also have a child at home who loves all things elf, don’t miss out on this magic game. As a parent, you may also want to consider giving your child an elf challenge coin for an important day. It is now popular to make a challenge coin of a favourite animated pattern or character as a gift, which is a hot and thoughtful way to give a gift. Order Now.