How to Make Color Fight Powder

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Learn how to make color powder for a color run or color fight! This DIY is so satisfying, because after you make it you get to toss it around. Read our simple tutorial and make some for a party or event!

how to make color fight powder for a baby gender reveal
how to make color fight powder for a baby gender reveal
how to make color fight powder for a baby gender reveal
how to make color fight powder for a baby gender reveal

I’ve been wanting to try this project foreeeevvvver! Combine that with the fact that we were looking for a fun idea for a baby gender reveal and we had the perfect storm, gang. SO! This post is jam-packed with not only a super rad tutorial on how to make color powder, but we’re finally telling whether we’re having a boy or a girl!

Be sure to get all the way to the bottom of the post to find out. 🙂 That, and I’m sure you want to see a bunch of gratuitous photos of Ryan and I deep in the throes of a color fight.

Before you dive in, check out these other fun activities to do with families! There are tons of free or cheap ideas to keep you busy all summer long.

And if you love these ideas, enter your info below to join our exclusive list where I send DIYs, inspiration, and tons of ideas.

Ways to Use Color Powder

There are so many fun uses for this stuff! While we decided to use it for a gender reveal, you could also just go outside and have a color fight. It’s truly so much fun to throw around.

If you’re participating in a color run, you could also learn how to make color powder for yourself! Create custom colors for your team or just make some extra that you can use along the way.

Another really fun idea would be to make color powder for a birthday party! How fun would it be to let all the kids go crazy and then just hose them down afterward? They would totally love it. So here’s how to make color powder!

How to Make Color Powder

Materials

Make Time: 2 Hours (Plus Drying Time)

how to make color fight powder for a baby gender reveal

Instructions:

  1. Measure out your ingredients. Per color, we used 1 cup of cornstarch and 1/2 cup of water. Mix these together thoroughly; I found it easiest to just squish it all with my hands until it was blended.
  2. Mix in your food color. Add a bit at a time until you have the desired color — we wanted ours super saturated so we used food coloring gel, rather than drops.
  3. Keep mixing different bowls of color until you have all of the shades that you want. Set the bowls of color somewhere to dry where they won’t be disturbed. Leave them to dry until the surface is cracking (ours took a couple of days).
  4. Use a fork to break up the dry mixture into large chunks. Then place these chunks in a food processor and grind them to as fine a powder as you can.
  5. Next, spread each different color out on a baking sheet. Pre-heat your oven to about 300, turn it off, and place the baking sheets inside for about 15 minutes. This helps remove any remaining water from the powder.
  6. Remove the sheets from the oven. If your powder is fine enough to through, great! You’re done. If not, I recommend running the powder through the food processor again to get it as fine as possible. The finer the powder, the more poof you’ll have during your color fight!

We’re Having A…

“But Chelsea,” I hear you saying, “it was fun learning how to make color powder, but didn’t you say something about a baby gender reveal? ” Yes, yes I did. And so I’m pretty excited to finally tell you that we’re having a…

how to make color fight powder for a baby gender reveal
how to make color fight powder for a baby gender reveal
how to make color fight powder for a baby gender reveal
how to make color fight powder for a baby gender reveal

IT’S A LITTLE GIRL!!! Oh my gosh a baby girl. I still don’t know what to think. Another crazy, wonderful adventure! But more about that later. Right now, we have a color fight to attend to.

how to make color fight powder for a baby gender reveal

And seriously, if you try this one out be sure to have lots of cleaning supplies handy (particularly hand soap) because it’s bound to get a little messy. And as soon as you start touching things with the DIY color powder on your hands it’s everywhere! Don’t say I didn’t warn you.

It’s all part of how to make color powder. But it makes for a realllllly fun time, in case you can’t tell from the photos of Ryan and I throwing the stuff directly in each other’s faces. What a guy. xoxo

how to make color fight powder for a baby gender reveal

This post contains affiliate links for your convenience. This means that I receive a small commission should you make a purchase via one of these links, at no extra cost to you. This post is sponsored by Method.

Color fight photos by Scot Woodman

color fight powder

How to Make Color Powder

Yield: Color Fight Powder
Active Time: 2 hours
Total Time: 2 hours
Difficulty: Easy
Estimated Cost: $15

Learn how to make color powder with this fun and easy tutorial! Perfect for color runs, color fights, gender reveals, parties, and more.

Materials

  • Cornstarch
  • Water
  • Food coloring gel
  • Mixing bowls

Tools

  • Oven
  • Baking sheets
  • Food processor

Instructions

    1. Measure out your ingredients. Per color, we used 1 cup of cornstarch and 1/2 cup of water. Mix these together thoroughly; I found it easiest to just squish it all with my hands until it was blended.
    2. Mix in your food color. Add a bit at a time until you have the desired color -- we wanted ours super saturated so we used food coloring gel, rather than drops.
    3. Keep mixing different bowls of color until you have all of the shades that you want. Set the bowls of color somewhere to dry where they won't be disturbed. Leave them to dry until the surface is cracking (ours took a couple of days).
    4. Use a fork to break up the dry mixture into large chunks. Then place these chunks in a food processor and grind them to as fine a powder as you can.
    5. Next, spread each different color out on a baking sheet. Pre-heat your oven to about 300, turn it off, and place the baking sheets inside for about 15 minutes. This helps remove any remaining water from the powder.
    6. Remove the sheets from the oven. If your powder is fine enough to through, great! You're done. If not, I recommend running the powder through the food processor again to get it as fine as possible. The finer the powder, the more poof you'll have during your color fight!

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35 Comments

  1. YAY YAY YAY! ALL THE YAYS! I am so thrilled for you guys. I can’t wait for little guy to have a tiny baby sister!

  2. OMG this is the cutest gender reveal ever! YAY for another boss lady coming into the world!

  3. OHMYGOSH!!!!!!!!!! eeeeeeeek, I’m so excited!! hahahaha great gender reveal! XOXOXOXO (in pink 🙂 )

  4. Chelsea and Ryan, How wonderful. Can’t wait to meet her. I love the photo at the end with your faces all colorful.

    1. thank you, thank you Pat! she’ll be here before we know it. ? and p.s. we also love that photo!

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  7. In the end, how much do you think it ended up costing for all the ingredients you used and how much powder did you get out of it?
    Seeing if this is cheaper than just buying it already made.

  8. Pingback: 11 unique gender reveal party ideas that will surprise everyone | Cool Mom Picks
  9. Is there a way to speed up the “non-disturbing” process? I want to o this idea but I don’t have a couple of days to wait for it to dry out 🙁

    1. Hi Tierra! You could try drying it out for a little extra time in a really low heat oven, but I can’t guarantee the outcome as I didn’t test it out that way. Hope it works for you!

  10. How much does this “recipe” make? We are wanting to do a gender reveal with one of those “exploding targets” and everything we’ve read about it says to use 15 lbs of colored powder. I was also wondering what your total cost of ingredients was? Not sure if it is just cheaper to buy it already made.

    1. Hi Leanne! It’s been a while now so I can’t quite remember the total cost but I would estimate around $40. We already had the food coloring so that was pretty much all cornstarch. We did one cup of cornstarch per color and made 10-12 different colors just to experiment. I’m not sure about how the target thing would work, but it does seem like you’d need a lot more powder to get the effect you’re going for. In all of our photos, what you see are just one or two handfuls being thrown. So if you need that much powder it might be smarter to buy it in bulk online! 🙂

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    1. Hi Tansy! Thanks for your question. Unfortunately I can’t really provide an answer because I’ve never tried that technique! Theoretically the color powder would work once it was out of the bag but I can’t say whether the tire burnout would actually break the bag open. Wish I could be more help. Best of luck!

  12. IMPORTANT GENDER REVEAL QUESTION. SUGGESTIONS NEEDED. is it really a gender “reveal” if you were holding the powder and just threw it? You’d have to know whether you’re throwing blue or pink unless you’re blindfolded and someone puts it in your hand….but I want to be surprised AND have some cool pics. Any idea like what kind of container/process we could do for an actual surprising reveal of the powder??????

    1. Hi Miranda! The tutorial is for the powder alone, we figured that it would be fun to put your own spin on it! A few ideas for using the powder: have someone put it in balloons and then popping them, have the OTHER people at your party throw the powder as a surprise for you, have someone load confetti tubes with the powder that you can throw yourself. Have fun!

  13. I am throwing my sister in law a gender reveal party, we both loved this idea. What do you put the powder in to throw at each other for the gender reveal?