Grow Your Own Salt Crystals ~ Science Project

We've been studying rocks, minerals and gems for Science class the past few weeks. (Gage's 5th grade studies)
Our Abeka textbook included the directions on how to grow your own crystrals so we thought that we would give it a try.
First we gathered all the needed supplies.

-An old glass dish * I used an old pie pan*
-liquid bluing (found in the laundry detergent section at the grocery store
-clear ammonia
-water
-table salt
-a small brick
-a 1 c. measuring cup
-a tablespoon
-an old cup or paper cup
-hammer
-food coloring (optional)

Take hammer and brick outside and pound into smaller pieces.
Thoroughly wet each piece of brick by running under cold water.
Shake the excess water off of them and then place them in glass dish.

In paper cup, mix 6 tbsp. water, 6 tbsp. bluing and 1 tbsp. ammonia.
Pour mixture over the bricks so that all pieces are coated.

Sprinkle 6 tbsp. salt over the brick pieces.

You can now add a few drops of food coloring if you choose.

                    (Can you see the drop of food coloring?)
Place dish in a well ventilated location where it will not be disturbed. ( I left ours on the kitchen counter. However, if you have little ones around you will need to keep this up and out of their reach for safety purposes.)
We were amazed each day to see the new growth.

You can read more about these and get an explanation of how they grow by visiting MRS. STEWART'S BLUING.


On the homefront:
It's been a warm but windy day. The winds began picking up late this afternoon and at one point Katie came running inside. Stuff was blowing everywhere, the electric lines were swaying up and down and I could hear things being scooted across the back porch. I went to check on things and when I returned I looked out the front window to see a piece of my Dad's roofing all curled up and the plywood exposed. Needless to say we all got soaked as we hurried to fix it before the wind tore anymore of it loose. It's a temporary fix but it will do until tomorrow.
Lots of downed power lines and trees in the area. Mom & Dad have no power, yet we do. (They live right across the street from us.) We must be on two separate lines but it's kind of nice that way. If one of us loses power- the other usually still has it. Mom just brought their dinner over to warm it up in our oven and the power company is working on the problem so hopefully they will have electric soon. The temps. are going to take a nosedive later tonight & go back down into the 30's so everyone will need the electric to turn their furnaces back on. 
Well, that's all I've got for today.
Hope you all had a great day!
And to Misty - Hope you had a great Birthday!