Crystal Snowflakes

My kids have been obsessed with making crystals lately. We’ve actually gone through an entire box of Borax making crystals over the past week! We decided for Snow in Summer Week, we just had to make snowflake crystals! These are so pretty and sparkly—perfect to get us dreaming of icy cold weather! 🧊

Supplies:

🔲 Borax

🔲 pipe cleaners (the colors chosen will be the color of the snowflakes so keep that in mind)

🔲 popsicle sticks or skewers or pencils

🔲 string or ribbon

🔲 glass jars (I grabbed some from my recycling, rinsed them out and then tossed them once we were done. You can clean the jars to reuse, but it’s kind of a pain!)

To Make:

To start, shape your pipe cleaners into snowflake shapes. We made a few different variations, but here‘s how to make a standard snowflake:

Fold a pipe cleaner into thirds and cut into three pieces. Then fold them around like the photo below, separating them into six prongs.

Next, take a pipe cleaner of the same color and cut it into six small pieces. I didn’t measure this part, but the pieces were about 1.5 inches.

Twist each small piece around one of the six prongs of the snowflake.

Here are some other ideas for snowflakes:

Tie a string to each snowflake and attach it to a stick or pencil. Insert the snowflakes into the jars. Check to make sure they aren’t sitting on the bottom or touching the sides. Cut and/or adjust the string as necessary. Then remove the snowflakes and set aside.

To make the Borax solution, you will dissolve 3 T of Borax in every cup of boiling water. We put a pot of water on the stove, measured the Borax into the jars, and then added the boiling water directly to the jars, stirring until all the Borax dissolved. (To do it that way, you need to know about how many cups of water the jars hold.) You can also mix the Borax and water in your pot and then dish it out among the jars. Just make sure to clean your pot fairly quickly before crystals start to form in it. It’s a pain to clean when that happens!

Place your snowflakes back into the jars, again making sure they are suspended without touching the sides or the bottom. Let them sit for five hours or overnight.

Once crystals have formed on your snowflakes (after about five hours,) they are ready to be removed. Pull up by the stick and set them out on paper towels to dry. You can also gently cut off the string.

Once dry they are ready to be hung in windows or saved for Christmas trees. Enjoy your sparkly creations! ❄️

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Show us your crystal creations! Share photos @little.sunshine.mom!☀️