The kids had so much fun making the Shamrock Crystals that we made for St. Patrick’s Day, we decided to make an Easter version. I love how these simple Easter Borax Crystals turned out, they make my kitchen window so cheerful!
Start by creating simple Easter shapes out of colorful pipe cleaners. We chose to make Easter eggs and chicks. Pipe cleaners are easy for kids to shape and form. We found that the brighter the pipe cleaners work best.
Next we placed our pipe cleaners into a solution of 3 cups of boiling water and 1/2 cup borax. (Detailed instructions for making these simple crystals can be found here.)
These little guys turned out so adorable! I love how the crystals sparkle in the sun. It has been a bit grey and cloudy the last few days so it has been hard to get great pictures.
Here is a link to a fun list of great experiments that my kids love, and your will too.
If you don’t want to miss out on any of the fun we are having at Housing A Forest, make sure to follow us on Pinterest, Facebook and Twitter.
If you don’t want to miss out on any of the fun we are having at Housing A Forest, make sure to follow us on Pinterest, Facebook, Google + and Twitter.
Tammy
Oh wow these look fabulous! And what a special and exciting craft for exploring young minds! Love it!!!
Thank you for linking up to Kids Get Crafty! Lovely to see you there!
Maggy
About how long does it take for the crystals to start forming?
We leave the pipe cleaners in overnight and in the morning they are covered in crystals. The crystals start forming within a couple of hours. Hope this helps.
we made snowflakes like this at Christmas–maybe we need to revisit! So cute!
You are a genius! Would have never thought to do an Easter one!
What a fun idea! It’s not just for snowflakes!
New link party! It’s Playtime
http://www.theimaginationtree.com/2011/04/introducingits-playtime.html
Thanks for letting me know! I just linked up.
This is absolutely ADORABLE!!! Such a great idea!! Thanks for linking up!
i love these! just bought some borax, so now i have no excuse but to try this out. we’ve been planning to make some sugar crystals, which may have to happen first since my daughter took one look at your chicks and eggs and asked “can we eat those?”
Wow! I have never seen anything like this before! I don’t know what the UK equivilent of Borax is but I’m on a mission to find out! Thanks so much for linking up to It’s Playtime!
The crystals make the pipe cleaners look lighter, almost pastel and very springlike. I’ve seen this done with string but never with pipe cleaners. Very neat project!
I still have yet to try this – I’ve been meaning to since I saw your St Patty’s Clovers – I just gotta get some Borax and its at the top of my list to do!
Thanks for linking up to It’s Playtime this week, I hope to see more of your ideas next Thursday too!
Jamie @ hands on : as we grow
Do you have to have mason jars or can you just use glasses? I don’t have mason jars and the last time I looked for them (around Valentine’s Day) the told me they were seasonal.
Love it!
What a fun idea–I will definitely be making these at preschool! Thanks for sharing at Beyond The Picket Fence.
Super cute! Thanks so much for linkin up. Can’t wait to see what you have for next week.
ha ha… I LOVE these!!! I was thinking last week, how cool would it be to do each letter of the alphabet and string them all up! These are so fun! Hmmm…. I may add these to my features for this week’s link party kick off. You’ll have to drop by to see!
I am going to share this link on my Facebook page right now…
Thanks so much for sharing this at For the Kids Friday Link Party! I will be posting the next party tomorrow night. I hope to have you stop by and join us for another week sharing great ideas for our kids!!
Thanks for stopping by!
rachel at http://SunScholars.blogspot.com
We have been having SO much fun creating crystals. Funny you should mention making letters, my mom just finished making names as baby gifts out of the crystals. They look so cute! I think the whole alphabet would be great!
I LOVE these! I’m just wondering if they go “bad”? Do the crystals fall off? Or mold? Or anything weird? Did you throw out the shamrock ones? Thanks!
I have our Shamrocks wrapped in tissue paper and I am storing them until next year. The crystals seem to be really durable and have not molded. A few of the crystals have fallen off, but the crystals are still fully covering the pipe cleaners. I think that as long as the crystals are stored in a dry place they should be fine. Hope this helps!
These will be great for my niece who will start teaching next year thanks
These are so cool! We will be doing it for Easter this year! I’d love to invite you to share this at Teach Me Tuesday — you can link up at http://PreschoolPowolPackets.blogspot.com. I hope to see you there!
Thanks for inviting me!
I’m so glad you made it! These really are awesome!!
Thanks for sharing ! it looks rgeat, but unfortunately, we can’t find the “real” borax anymore in the UK… Do you know if we can try with womething else ?
Thank you !!
I made these with my girls – they loved them. So pretty. I see so many other shapes that would be fun to try. I`m sure we`ll do this again. Thanks for sharing – found you on pinterest.
http://howtodosomething.blogspot.ca/2012/04/how-to-make-crystals.html
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wondering about borax for kids crafts because on the box it says to keep out of reach of children. is it safe to use in crafts?
These look SO cute, but I just have to ask. When you eat these treats doesn’t the fuzz from the pipe cleaners get ingested to?
Amanda, These are for decoration purposes only! They look wonderful hanging in a window, however they are not meant to be consumed. They contain Borax, which is a chemical. If you are looking to make rock candy (which looks similar), here is a wonderful recipe http://www.sciencebob.com/experiments/rockcandy.php Hope this helps!
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Once the project is done (which was way fun, by the way!); any hints how to get the crystals out of my jars?! I’d wanted to reuse them if possible…. Thanks for any hints!
Emily, just run hot water into your jars and the crystals will dissolve. Glad you enjoyed it:)