A few weeks ago, the kids and I were making these crystal snowflakes and we had a little happy accident. Not the Bob Ross kind where you end up with a creek or some extra trees, but the kind where you end up with beautiful crystal ivy bowls that make perfect candle holders!
In the past when we’ve made these crystal snowflakes, I have just dumped out the water and scraped out the extra crystals, but this time, I didn’t do that. Here’s the method I used.
What you Need for your Crystal Candle Holders
- A boatload (approximately 1 cup or more) of Borax (found near the laundry detergent)
- 3 cups of water
- Ivy bowl (Other vases kind of work for this, but the bowls work best because of the rounded sides for the crystals to grow up. I really like these with the fluted edges–they’re so pretty! And they’re from Dollar Tree! Can’t really beat $1.)
Growing your crystals
Why not give edible crystals a try? Check out this Rock Candy DIY!
(Warning: Borax dust can be irritating to the eyes and skin.)
Step 1: Boil the Water
Boiling water creates the ability to for more of the borax to dissolve in it. It essentially makes the water molecules spread out and “take in” more of the borax molecules. It creates a suspension where the borax can hang out until the water starts to cool.
Stet 2: Pour the Water into the Rose Bowl
You want the water to be super, super hot when you pour it into the bowl. Just under boiling point. Run the glass under hot water before doing this to prevent it from cracking. Also, be careful. The boiling water is hot. So nobody sue me because you poured hot water on yourself, okay? Good. Now that we’re done with that…
Want to grow more crystals? Try these Rose Quartz Crystals.
Step 3: Add the Borax
Another warning. Borax can irritate the eyes and skin and it creates a lot of dust. Don’t get too close to where you’re pouring. Okay, now that that’s out of the way, you want to dump in as much borax as the water will take. Start with 1/2 cup, then add more and more and more. Keep stirring. When the borax all (or almost all) dissolves, add more. When the borax is no longer dissolving and there is some floating around at the bottom, you’ll know you have enough for beautiful crystals.
Step 4: Wait Patiently
As the water cools, the molecules will get closer together, pushing the borax molecules out. Those molecules will grab onto whatever they can (in this case, the borax that didn’t dissolve and is sitting at the bottom of the vase) and begin forming crystals. From the time you finish stirring, you do not want to disturb the vase. Put it somewhere and don’t touch! Wait about an hour and you’ll begin to see the crystals growing up the sides of the rose bowl. After several hours (mine only took about four), the crystals will have covered the sides of the vase. After about 24 hours, you’ll be ready to pour out the water.
Love growing crystals? Try these Crystal Egg Geodes!
Step 5: Pour out the Water and Let your Crystal Candle Holders Dry
Very gently, pour out the water. You don’t want to jostle it too much or some of the crystals could break off. Let the vase dry and you’re good to go! You might need to chip a little of the crystal off the bottoms of the bowl so the candle will sit flat. You can do that with a butter knife or a spoon. Just gently chip away what you don’t need. And that’s it! You’re left with these beautiful crystal candle holders!
How it works
These crystal candle holders are a great science lesson about how water molecules work, how solutions are made, and how crystals are formed, along with being a beautiful decoration for your home!
How Water Molecules Act
At room temperature, water molecules move at a steady pace. (Molecules are the things that make up water. They are so tiny that you can’t see them without a very strong microscope.) When water is heated or cooled, the molecules that make it up move at different speeds.
As you heat up water, the molecules move faster and move away from each other. When heated enough, those molecules will evaporate and become a gas.
When you cool water down, it does the opposite. The molecules slow down and get closer together. If cooled enough, the molecules stop moving altogether, and you get ice!
Solutions and Suspensions
If you put a solid into a liquid and it dissolves, you’ve formed a solution. Think about how you make Kool-aid. You dump powder into water and it disappears. Kool-aid is a solution.
To make a suspension, you want to add MORE of the solid than the liquid will hold at room temperature. To do that, you heat up the liquid. The molecules begin to move apart and more of the solid particles can dissolve. When making the suspension for this project, the water looked cloudy because there was so much borax just sitting there, “suspended” in the water.
How the Crystals Form on the Rose Bowl
In this project, as the water began to cool, there was less room for the borax particles. The water molecules begin to move closer together and they pushed the borax particles out. As those particles came out of the water, they grabbed onto whatever they could (places called nucleation sites). Imperfections in the glass jar, bumps, cracks, the extra particles of borax at the bottom of the vase…anything they could!
First, seed crystals form. They are too tiny to see without a microscope. But soon, as more borax is pushed out of the suspension, visible crystals begin to form! The more the water cools, the more crystals form until the whole jar is covered with them!
I hope you enjoy trying this project at home! If you’re feeling crafty, check out these other posts for ideas and inspiration!
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