My daughter recently received the Youniverse Crystal Growing Unicorn project as a birthday present. Both of my daughters are going through a unicorn obsession so this was the perfect gift. We waited for a rainy day in which to start the project. The kit comes with everything you need to grow and paint 1 molded unicorn. In addition to the unicorn it contains alum powder for growing the crystals, three bottles of coloring dye, one glitter packet, one paint pot, one paint pallete, one poster and simple directions.
Initially I was concerned about my ability to grow the crystals as we’ve had craft projects fail before but fortunately this project was relatively fun and easy. The only drawback we had was finding the right size container in which to grow the crystals. The unicorn needs to be completely covered with four cups of water. I tried every Pyrex dish and vase I had and still the horn poked up out of the water. I eventually went to the local thrift store and found a vase that I thought would work. It ended up being too small so I used a plastic lemonade pitcher. This worked perfectly. My kids were a bit disappointed because they couldn’t view the crystals growing but once I took the unicorn out to dry, they didn’t care.
The crystals formed well although there were sections on the face where they didn’t form at all. Fortunately this was easy to cover up with the dye. Both of my children had a wonderful time painting, decorating and mixing colors on the unicorn. It was heartwarming to see them working together and sharing. The finished product was beautiful and my daughter has displayed it on her dresser.
I would recommend this product to any child that loves art and unicorns. It was the perfect rainy day project. I read a lot of reviews stating difficulty in getting the crystals to form. Fortunately we didn’t have this problem. Even without the crystals forming it would still be a fun project to simply paint and decorate.
My daughter got this as a gift for her birthday and the crystals didn’t form at all. What can we do? Is there a way to redo it somehow with what we’ve got from the solution in the kit if we start over?
Ah, that’s too bad. I’m not sure what can be done as I review products. I would suggest contacting the manufacturer. However, when I was researching the product, many children had fun just painting the unicorn without the crystals. It still would be a beautiful creation to have on her shelf!
I did the same thing plastic lemonade pitcher! but nothing grew not even a hint of a crystal. we followed the instructions to the letter. My daughter was not very happy, I wasn’t impressed with this product will not purchase anything that has this name brand again.
Ah, what a bummer! While reading reviews myself, that was a common complaint. Thank you for the information!