at the top of the bottles before you freeze them.

Two of my water jugs developed leaks because the expansion of the ice popped the seams on the bottom. I learned the hard way to leave a sufficient air gap when filling them with water so the ice has room to expand. So I am now doing an experiment with different plastic drinking bottles to see which ones hold up to freezing. (It just happened that I am out of water jugs, and I had a variety of plastic bottles in the car. This is not really a planned experiment, but we will make the most of what we have.)

I like freezing the gallon jugs because the ice lasts a long time, even in the Texas heat. The smaller drinking bottles won’t be frozen as long, but they will last longer than regular sized ice cubes.