Fluorescent Jars

Do you ever find yourself buying highlighters because there's this little voice in your head saying, "You are going to pay attention in class. You are going to highlight important information!" Then... you never actually do that? I do. So, I often find myself with twenty-three highlighters. I'm a hoarder. However, I was thinking about something. I posted a tutorial about making glitter jars, and while roaming the internet I saw these glowing jars.

Which with a glowing jar you just cut open a glow stick and shake it away. After a while that fades. I was looking for something a bit more permanent. Everyone knows that anything fluorescent will glow under a blacklight, and that highlighters are made with fluorescent ink. I thought why couldn't I put that in a jar? So, I tried and these are my results. I'll include pictures.

Items Needed

• Highlighters
• Water
• Jar
• Black light/UV light
• Funnel (Optional. This was used because the jar I used was bottle nosed.)

For this experiment I decided to use one of my pretty liquere bottles that I collect. This is a 60ML Hpnotiq bottle, which if you can't see already has a bit of a cloudy effect.

Step One

Grab everything that you'll need to do this. One highlighter was more than enough for a small bottle. If you're going to use a jar about eight or more ounces I would suggest using at least three or four highlighters. Unless you want your solution to be more see through, I wanted mine to be cloudy.

Step Two

Some highlighters have a twist off bottom. If you are as unlucky as I am, you'll have a highlighter that does not cap off at the bottom. Don't worry though, you can saw through the highlighter, just try to get as close to the bottom as you can so you don't accidentally saw through the inkwell and spill all of that fluorescent ink that you need! Once you get the inkwell out of the case, hold it over your jar and squeeze it out. If you're patient you can sit it in the jar over night and let the room-temperature water to pull the ink out for you, you'll know when it's done because the yellow inkwell will be completely white.

Step Three

Then all you do is add as much or as little water as you want to fill your jar/vial. The more water you use the clearer the solution will be. Under a UV light these jars will glow so beautifully. I mixed some with a glitter jar, and the glitter + fluorescent solution was just so pretty. However, I prefer the little Hpnotiq bottle that I used with a cloudy glass. I hope that you enjoy your jars as much as I will be enjoying mine!