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DIY St. Patrick’s Day Rainbow In A Jar Craft

If you’re looking for a sweet way (literally) to celebrate St. Patrick’s Day, this DIY St. Patrick’s Day Rainbow Jar Craft is it.

For more ways to make this the best holiday, check out all of our St. Patrick’s Day posts.

A jar filled with Skittles to look like a rainbow, with gold coins, marshmallows, and Skittles around it with the words "DIY St. Patrick's Day Rainbow In A Jar" digitally written on top.

St. Patrick’s Day is this week. We celebrate every year at the local parade, which is always a good time. And we celebrate with Shepherds Pie. This year we’re doing that a little bit early because St. Patrick’s Day is on a Friday during Lent, so we need a meatless meal.

If you want to celebrate a little early too, you can make this fun DIY St. Patrick’s Day Candy Rainbow In A Jar craft.

It’s a fun project to do with young children. They can work on colors and fine motor skills while separating the candies. And who doesn’t love an activity where kids are learning too?

But, the best part? You’ll have a sweet treat to eat.

Shamrocks cut from cardstock with scissors and the words "30+ St. Patrick's Day Crafts" digitally written on top.

This rainbow jar isn’t our only St. Patrick’s Day craft on Drugstore Divas. For more ideas, check out our list of St. Patrick’s Day Crafts And Snack Ideas.

St. Patrick’s Day Rainbow In A Jar Craft

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A bag of Skittles, mini marshmallows, gold chocolate coins, and a mason jar.

St. Patrick’s Day Rainbow In A Jar Craft Supplies:

How To Make A St. Patrick’s Day Rainbow In A Jar:

Gold chocolate coins in the bottom of a mason jar.

Fill the bottom of the jar with a handful of chocolate gold coins. These do, of course, represent the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, so that’s why they go in the jar first.

Five piles of Skittles.

Open the Skittles and separate the different colors into piles.

If you have young kids, let them do the sorting. It’s a really fun way to help them with colors, sorting, and grouping things together. It’s a great way to teach them about similarities and differences without it feeling like school.

Purple Skittles in the bottom of a mason jar.

Layer them in the jar in the opposite order of colors of the rainbow (purple, green, yellow, orange, then red).

Mini marshmallows on the top of a mason jar that's filled with Skittles.

Fill the remainder of the jar with mini marshmallows. Of course, the marshmallows are meant to be the clouds at the top of the rainbow.

Close the jar.

This is absolutely perfect to put out on your desk at work or just to give your neighbor as a festive treat.

If you’re putting this out in a common area, like your work desk, be sure to pair it with a spoon of some sort. You don’t want everyone’s hands all over your candy.

A rainbow in a jar craft.

St. Patrick’s Day Rainbow Jar: Frequently Asked Questions

What size mason jar works best in this craft?

We used a pint sized (16 oz.) mason jar in this craft. This fits about 3/4 of a large bag of Skittles (the 15.6 oz. sharing size bags). If you used a smaller mason jar, like the 8 oz. half pint size, you would need less candy to fill it.

Can you use any jar for this?

You can use any glass jar for this, as long as it’s food safe. You can’t put unwrapped candy in a jar that’s not food grade, unless you’re just using this for decoration.

Glass works better than plastic because you can see through it better. And there’s no point in making rainbow crafts if you can’t, well, see the rainbow.

So go ahead and use a pickle or marinara sauce jar that you’re upcycling. That makes it a frugal craft. If you don’t have a jar to upcycle, you can purchase single mason jars at Dollar Tree. That’s a lot better than having to buy a case of 12 at Walmart just for a single jar.

What if you can’t find chocolate coins?

If you can’t find gold chocolate coins at your local store (which, honestly, is actually harder to do than I thought), you can use Rolo candies instead. You’ll need to buy the Rolo candies that come in a bag because those ones are covered in gold wrapping. The ones that you can get at checkout aren’t individually wrapped.

If you’re looking, I was able to find gold chocolate coins at Big Lots. I couldn’t find them in any of my other local stores. If you’re set on the coins, and can’t find them locally, you can actually order chocolate coins online.

What can you use instead of Skittles?

If you don’t want to use Skittles, you can use any candy as long as it comes in rainbow colors. Or, enough colors so that you can make a rainbow.

I wouldn’t suggest something like M&M’s because the brown ones wouldn’t fit with this craft and you’d have to buy a ton of bags of M&M’s (or really large bags) in order to get enough chocolate to fill the mason jar.

Can you add a gift tag to this?

We made this for ourselves, so we didn’t include a gift tag. However, if you’re making this as a gift, you can absolutely attach a gift tag.

Tie a bit of twine to your gift tag, then tie that around the mason jar. What would be really cute is if you cut a gift card in a shamrock shape and really kept with the St. Patrick’s Day theme.

I wouldn’t do any decorating other than that to the lid of the jar or the jar itself. Adding some Mod Podge and gold glitter would be cute, but it wouldn’t be food safe and your recipient might not actually be able to eat your treat.

A St. Patrick's Day Pot O' Gold Treat Bucket.

More St. Patrick’s Day Ideas:

If you’re looking for a few more easy St. Patrick’s Day crafts, we have a few more fun ideas for you.

If you’re looking for a similar pot of gold craft, our DIY St. Patrick’s Day “Pot O’ Gold” Treat Bucket is for you. That’s another one with candy, so hopefully you have a sweet tooth.

For more a traditional craft, go with our DIY Leprechaun Hats. Those are made from toilet paper rolls and make really cute St. Patrick’s Day decorations.

Yield: 1 Jar

DIY St. Patrick’s Day Rainbow In A Jar Craft

If you’re looking for a sweet way (literally) to celebrate St. Patrick’s Day, this DIY St. Patrick’s Day Rainbow Jar Craft is it.

Active Time 10 minutes
Total Time 10 minutes
Difficulty Easy

Materials

  • Mason jar
  • 1 bag Chocolate gold coins
  • Share size (15.6 oz) bag of Skittles
  • Mini marshmallows

Instructions

  1. Fill the bottom of the jar with a handful of chocolate gold coins.
  2. Open the Skittles and separate the different colors into piles.
  3. Layer them in the jar in the opposite order of colors of the rainbow (purple, green, yellow, orange, then red).
  4. Fill the remainder of the jar with mini marshmallows. Of course, the marshmallows are meant to be the clouds at the top of the rainbow.
  5. Close the jar.

Have you made this St. Patrick’s Day Rainbow In A Jar? Let us know how it went in the comments.

stephanie

Thursday 7th of March 2024

Creative and such a fun idea!

Debra

Sunday 3rd of March 2024

I would never even thought about making such a cute little gift for St. Paddy's Day. Adorable!

Joanne

Wednesday 28th of February 2024

Yummy and so cute!

Jennifer Wise

Tuesday 27th of February 2024

This is super cute! Thanks for sharing.

Nicole

Wednesday 2nd of March 2016

Such a cute idea!

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