Science Experiment: Borax Crystal Hearts

This is fun experiment with very cool results.  Our inspiration was from The Scientific Mom.  She created Borax Crystal Ornaments as part of her 12 Days of Science Series with her daughter.  Be sure to check out her blog here to find out about all the amazing excursions and experiments that she does with her daughter.  We decided to make borax crystal hearts for Valentine's day and a few snowflakes for Winter.  Keep reading to find out how we made these.

To make Borax Crystal Hearts You'll Need:

Pipe Cleaners

20 Mule Team Borax (found in the laundry section  of the grocery store) (5-6 Tablespoons or more)
***Borax is not-edible and should be handled with care when using with children)

Water (2 Cups or so)

Jar or Glass Container

Pencil or stick

The first step in making these is to shape a pipe cleaner into a the shape you desire.  Make sure to form a hanger or add one to the shape using the pipe cleaner. Then boil about 2 cups of water (depends on how big your glass container is), let cool a little and pour into your glass container. Then, take about 6 Tablespoons of Borax and stir into the water until dissolved.  Then hang your pipe cleaner shape from a pencil. Place the pencil on top of the glass container.  Make sure it is submerged.

You can add more Borax which will create more crystals.  Let this sit over night, and the next morning  you'll have beautiful crystal shapes. ***Keep the pipe cleaner submerged over night! It was fun to experiment and check them the next morning.  Here are some of our results:

Close-up Crystals

Red Metallic Heart

Silver Pipe Cleaner Snowflake

Swirls

We had a lot of fun experimenting with this idea. We tried adding food color, but the colorful pipe cleaners really brought out the color too.  Have fun with this experiment and let me know your results!

Making Two Kinds of Slime

As I said in my last post, we've been reminiscing about old projects, experiments, and recipes in my blog books from Blog2print. This time my daughter wanted to make slime again after seeing the post here.  Not only did we make that kind of slime, but we also made a different kind of slime too. Keep reading to find out the 2 types of slime we made.

Recipe #1 Slime:

Mix in one bowl:
3/4 cup warm water
1 cup white glue
few drops of food coloring

Mix in a second bowl:
1 1/3 cups warm water
4 teaspoons Borax
(Borax is found in the laundry section.  ****Borax should not be ingested and can cause skin reactions with some... so use your discretion!)

Pour contents of first bowl into second bowl and let sit for one minute without stirring. Then explore Slime #1!


Recipe #2 Slime:
1/4 cup water
1/4 cup white glue
1/4 cup liquid starch
few drops of food coloring

Pour all glue in mixing bowl and then add water.  Stir water and glue together.  Add food color.  Then lastly add starch. Then have fun with Slime #2.


Making the two kinds of Slime was fun in itself and this time my daughter could actually read the recipe, so making it a great reading activity and science experiment too.

We compared and contrasted the two kinds of Slime as we were playing with them:  Slime #1 was
more rubbery and Slime #2 was smoother and more squooshy.

Then very soon after, both slimes were mixed together....which ended all comparisons. (But it did prove that yellow-green and blue make green!)  Plastic bugs made a great companion for the slime play.

C covered the bugs with slime, tore it into tiny pieces, stretched it, and pressed bugs into it to make impressions. Slime makes for such creative and FUN play with endless possibilities.

Hope you are inspired to try out both recipes for Slime. 

 Do you know any other recipes for Slime?