How to Make Borax Crystal Snowflakes
Do you remember the first time you held a real crystal in your hand? Wasn’t it magical?
I remember it well! We bought one at a souvenir shop at a campsite where we were camping. You would have thought that I was holding the Hope Diamond! Well, that love of crystals has never left me, and when I learned that you can make your own crystals using Borax I was so excited!
I enlisted the kiddos and turned it into a homeschool science project! We decided to make snowflakes to start and then evolved to larger crystal sculptures. This is such a fun activity to do with your kids!!! Hello Elsa!
First let’s talk about the Science behind this. How to make borax crystal snowflakes overnight!
Well, we start by heating water because hot water holds more borax (sodium borate) crystals than cold water. That’s because heated water molecules are more active and move farther apart, making room for more of the borax crystals to dissolve. When no more of the solution can be dissolved, you have reached saturation.
As this solution cools, the water molecules move closer together again. Now there’s less room for the solution to hold onto as much of the dissolved borax. Crystals begin to form and build on one another as the water lets go of the excess and evaporates.
How to Make Borax Crystal Snowflakes
Supplies:
- 6 Tbsp Borax — where to find
- 2 cups boiling water
- Dental floss or string
- 1 Wide mouth mason jar — like this
- 1 white pipe cleaner
- 1 pencil or chopstick
Directions:
- Bring your water to a boil
- While waiting for the water to boil, cut your pipe cleaner into three equal sized pieces
- Now line the pipe cleaner pieces up and twist in the middle, to hold them together in a snowflake shape
- Tie the string or floss to one of the pieces of pipe cleaner, then tie onto the chopstick or pencil
- Pour 2 cups boiling water into the mason jar
- Add the borax
- Stir until it is dissolved
- Place the pipe cleaner into the water, letting it hang from the pencil or chopstick
- Leave your snowflake sitting on the counter overnight. In the morning it will be covered in crystals!
- Optional: you can add food coloring to make the snowflake pretty colors!
- Next up, we decided to take those pipe cleaners and mold them into rounded shapes, like a birds nest, and repeat the experiment. Wow, did we get some pretty crystals from this one!
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Hi, my name is Kate.
I love food. Real food. We eat all of the things that nursing school taught me were bad for you: butter, eggs, bacon, and raw milk.
I am a Nurse, a Mom, and a Real Food loving blogger. Just trying to save the world.
Curious if you are still homeschooling?
This is beautiful.
Thank you for sharing with
With us.You did explain very clear.
Thank you!
We are trying these out tonight!! Fingers crossed my 7 yr old boy is super excited.
Yay! I hope you have a ton of fun making them!
I remember doing this a long time ago, back in Ohio when I lived near a craft store, but we used a galvanized bucket and suspended grasses down into the solution and the crystals formed on the grasses and then used the grasses in a table arrangement. Lasted for a long time.
Sounds beautiful! I bet you could use those as icicle ornaments on a Christmas tree!
I was a special ed art teacher and in my last year I had plans that included borax. Unfortunately that plan never occurred and the borax came home. Thanks for giving me a simple plan. Hope to try it out soon.