Colored Macaroni

I was in Michael's today and I think everyone heard me laughing in the aisles. It was one of those moments where you see something in the store and say now why didn't I think to sell that! You know one of those #%@!, I could have been rich moments!!

Michael's is selling colored macaroni for $6.95 a pound!!!!!! The brand is "Art-a-Roni Colored Noodles" and after some online research I have even saw it for $7.95 a pound. Now that is a great mark-up:

Here is how to make your own colored macaroni for under $1.00 a pound:

1 cup of dry macaroni

2 tablespoons rubbing alcohol

Regular liquid food coloring (we use McCormack's)

Put the uncooked macaroni in a sandwich bag, put in rubbing alcohol and a few good size drops of food coloring. Seal bag and mush it all up so each piece is coated. Open bag, spread on paper towel or newspaper lined cookie sheets and let dry. Whaoola!!!
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Colored macaroni is great to play with, it can be used in all kinds of art projects especially collages and can be used in math and sorting projects too - the possibilities are endless.

In our house we make a big batch of colored ziti and penne right before Christmas and use some plastic lanyard string, to let the kids make big strings for our Christmas tree. It is our safe alternative to stringing popcorn. It actually looks really cute on the tree because the light shines through it a little and the kids love pointing out their "tree necklaces" to our family and friends.