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Friday, December 17, 2010

"Crystal" Ornaments

One day I decided to combine our art lesson with a science experiment.  The kids were thrilled with how their ornaments turned out.




{Update} A year later, the ornaments have now taken on a beautiful white sugary/candy appearance. Still very beautiful! This year we are going to try and take some white pipe cleaners and make snowflakes.




"Crystal" Ornaments:

Directions:
1. Boil water and pour into a glass jar.

2. Dissolve about 3-5 Tablespoons of Borax.



3. Bend and twist the pipe cleaners.

4. Tie them with string and hang them in the super saturated solution dangling from a pencil placed over the top of the jar.  Try and be careful not to let the ornament touch the side of the jar.  You'll see crystals forming in about 3 hours.  Keep them suspended in there for 24 hours.


5. Dry and make a loop out  of the sting to hang on the tree.


(My friend has also done this successfully with a super saturated solution of Epson Salts.)

6 comments:

  1. I just saw the snow flake version of this on Pinterest and bought the pipecleaners & Borax to do it! School's out & I CAN'T WAIT to have my kids all to myself for a whole week after the Christmas get- togethers end. :)

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  2. Can't wait to try this with all the kids, need to make sure I have plenty of Jars available!

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  3. have fun and enyjoy. so pretty. but keep up high on tree. posionous

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  4. Do you know of any alternatives for Borax in this craft? Would any powder detergent work? Also what did your friend use for the epson salt solution?

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    1. Lauren, I do not know if other detergents would work as I have only used Borax. Here is a link I found with how to make ornaments using epsom salt: http://a2zhomeschooling.com/explore/chemistry_kids/crystal_making_at_home/

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  5. These are so much fun to make.

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