Aquarium Night Light Box

Who does not like sea creatures? Let your little budding marine biologist help you with this aquarium night light box out of recycled materials!

This fun recycling project is just what you need to keep the kids occupied for a while and let the creative juices flow!

You will need:

• Cardboard box, (we used a six pack milk carton box)
• Paint
• Glue
• Polystyrene shapes
• Pipe cleaners
• Craft sticks
• Toilet rolls
• Egg carton
• Coloured card board
• Sand
• Gut or string
• LED lights
• Batteries

What to do:

Aquarium:

Open the milk carton on one side, cut a rectangle out of another piece of cardboard and glue it to the back of the carton. Paint the box blue, inside and out. Once the box is dry, poke a few holes in the top and bottom. The number of holes will depend on how many sea creatures and lights you want to add. The sea creatures will hang from the top and the lights will go through the bottom holes.

Sea Creatures

Anemone

Paint your toilet rolls, inside and out. Once the paint is dry, cut a few slits lengthwise but not all the way through. Bend the strips and add a bit of shading with crayons. Cut the anemone to fit in the aquarium.

Jellyfish

Tear your egg cartons and paint. Poke holes in the bottom of your jellyfish and attach the pipe cleaner to form the tentacles. Poke a tiny hole in the top to thread your gut for the jellyfish to hang. Add googly eyes or draw eyes with a marker pen.

Pufferfish

Paint a polystyrene ball and let it dry. Cut your craft sticks shorter and press into the ball. You can also use toothpicks, cut the sharp edges off. Use two craft sticks to form the frame for the back fin, cut a fin shape out of cardboard and glue to the frame on both sides. I used a curtain hook in the top to hang the pufferfish but you can use a normal pin and tie your gut around it. Add google eyes or draw eyes with a marker pen.

Fish

Paint a polystyrene heart in any colour of your choice. We painted ours yellow and used a marker pen for the black stripes. Press toothpicks into the polystyrene to form a frame for the fins and use cardboard or foam to shape in the same manner as the pufferfish. Add eyes and a hook to hang from.

Seaweed

Bundle pipe cleaners in different shades of green together and glue them to the bottom of the aquarium.

Before you assemble the aquarium, you can trim a cm or two off the front flaps of the box to give a better view inside the aquarium. Glue the flaps back into their original place and touch up with blue paint if needed. Glue the anemone in place. Push the LED lights through the bottom holes you have made previously. Hang your ocean creatures from the top holes and glue a piece of black paper on the top of the aquarium to hide the gut and holes.

Lastly, add some sea sand and connect your LED lights to the batteries.

And there you have a fabulous aquarium night light box made for next to nothing and which looks só cool at night!