Category Archives: periodic table

iridescence

January 31, 2010 – 2:04 pm

Do you know what happens when you add food coloring to ice and table salt?

Not only do you get a beautiful bowl of colored, fast melting ice; but you can experience iridescence if you use the right pigment. I’m not going to tell you which pigment causes this effect. You’ll have to try all of them to see for yourself. Of course, you can kind of tell in the pictures below, but try it and see if you are right.

you need:
ice
table salt
primary food colors
neon food colors- if you can only get one pack, get the neon
*I HIGHLY suggest using both types of food coloring, it’s the best way to discover the pigment that causes the iridescence

to do:
1. fill a bowl with ice
2. sprinkle (or pour, try different amounts) table salt onto the ice
3. add drops of food coloring onto the salt
4. you get instant results with some of the colors, no results with some, and have to be a little patient with one color

Here are some great links to explain what exactly is going on in this experiment and ways to understand what causes color:
1. SciScape
2. Causes of Color -LOVE this site! Explains color really well.

Don’t dump the ice when you are done, let the ice melt down and see what happens to the iridescence. Enjoy!

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periodic table science

science songs and videos (ptoe)

October 11, 2009 – 4:58 pm

Here’s a little post for my “science nerd” friends!

They Might Be Giants came out with a new science CD/DVD collection called Here Comes Science They Might be Giants! TMBG has always been a favorite band of mine and I find my little ladies loving them as well! Here’s a sneak peek video of their PTOE song- “Meet the Elements:”

Not a TMBG song but it is a pretty song and video about the water cycle.

Fauna is fascinated with this one! She wants to be able to sing it word for word. Good Luck Fauna!

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craft felt flowers herb kitchen chemistry leaves periodic table seeds sewing Uncategorized

natural dyes- walnuts and goldenrod

October 6, 2009 – 6:38 pm

Making natural dyes from backyard plants (or frontyard) is an activity we enjoy to do in the Autumn, when we can heat up the kitchen and still have a window or two open. Yesterday we gathered goldenrod, walnuts and pokeberry to dye a thrifted wool blanket and some wool roving.

What you need:

vinegar for plant dyes

salt for berry dyes

water

stainless steel pots- VERY IMPOTANT or a chemical reaction can occur with the color

cloth or fibers- light colored wool, cotton, silk or muslin works best for natural dyes

cheesecloth or coffee filter

strainer

plant material- flowers should be in full bloom, nuts mature, and berries ripe

Before dyeing the fibers you must soak them in a fixative in order for the dye to “stick”:

Berry dye fixative: 1/2 cup salt to 8 cups cold water

Plant dye fixative: 4 parts cold water to 1 part vinegar

Directions for fixative: Add the fabric to the fixative mixture and simmer for an hour; then rinse the fabric in cold water and ring out excess water.

Making the dye bath: While the fabric is soaking in the fixative prepare the dye bath. Chop up the plant material and place in a pan. Add the water by doubling the amount of water to plant material. I used a lot of water for the walnuts because they make such a strong dark dye. Bring the water to a boil, then simmer for about a half hour to an hour, depending on how potent you want the dye.

Dyeing the fabric: Strain plant material from the water. I found out the hard way that you should use cheesecloth or a coffee filter to catch little bits of plant material that go through the strainer. Add the fabric (while still wet from the fixative soak) to the dye bath. Simmer the fabric in the bath until the desired color is obtained. Keep in mind that the fabric will be lighter once it is rinsed and dry. After obtaining preferred color, rinse in cold water until water is clear. Hang to dry (don’t ya love the 1970′s brick fireplace with brass guard?).

The results are so pretty! The goldenrod (left) stained the wool a light creamy yellow color; the walnut stained the wool a beautiful brown with a chestnut tint. I’m planning on staining more wool with the walnut bath so I can make wool trees for the little ladies’ holiday gifts. Araina wants to make a leaf garland and Fauna wants to make a gathering bag with both colors of the stained wools. ****Note- all dyed fabric should be laundered separately in cold water.

You can do this natural dyeing process with any plants you find in your yard. Don’t be afraid to experiment with different plants to get different colors. Plantain and grass would probably make a pretty green color. I was thinking about trying leaf litter too. Have fun experimenting and if you do this please let me know how it turned out!

Note on the pokeberries- last year we used pokeberries to dye some wool and it came out a beautiful pink color. This year I simmered the berries in a NON-stainless steel pot (I used a large pot for canning) and the beautiful magenta berry color turned pale yellow, which is disappointing when you wanted pink! So I didn’t post that one. But learn from my mistakes and use stainless steel! Hopefully our now green pokeberries that are growing in the backyard will ripen before more nights of frost occur.

For you science lovers out there- learn about the chemical bonding of dyeing fabric here and to learn more about the different types of bonds go here. Enjoy!

Tags flowers, nature activity, nature study, plants, PTOE, sewing | Permalink | Comments (20)

flowers herb herbs periodic table

yellow wood sorrel (ptoe-oxalic acid)

September 15, 2009 – 10:26 pm

Yellow wood sorrel (Oxalis stricta) is another backyard edible. The leaves, flowers and unripe fruits are edible, with a sour, tart, lemony flavor; it’s sometimes referred to as “sour grass” because of the sour taste. Wood sorrel can be added to salads, soups, or sauces, or used as a seasoning. The leaves can be steeped in boiling water for 5-10 minutes and then sweetened to make a refreshing drink similar to lemonade. I am always reading that it should be consumed in moderation because the plant contains oxalic acid which is toxic in excessive amounts, but looking at this chart you get more oxalic acid from parsley, purslane, chives, rhubarb stems and spinach.

Vegetable or Fruit	Oxalic Acid Content as a percentage
Vegetable or Fruit	USDA	Dr. Duke	Litholink
Amaranth	1.09	—	—
Apples	—	—	0.00
Apricots	—	—	0.00
Asparagus	0.13	—	0.01
Beans	0.36	0.03	0.02
Beans, Fava	—	0.01	—
Beans, Garbanzo	—	0.00	—
Beans, Soy	—	0.08	—
Beets	—	0.04	0.68
Beet Greens	0.61	—	—
Blackberries	—	—	0.02
Blueberries	—	—	0.02
Broccoli	0.19	—	0.00
Brussels Sprouts	0.36	—	0.00
Cabbage	0.10	0.04	0.00
Carrots	0.50	0.01	0.00
Cauliflower	0.15	0.01	0.00
Celery	0.19	—	0.02
Chicory	0.21	—	—
Chard, Swiss	—	—	0.65
Cherries	—	—	0.00
Chives	1.48	—	0.00
Collards	0.45	—	0.07
Coriander	0.01	—	—
Corn, Sweet	0.01	0.01	0.01
Cucumbers	0.02	—	0.00
Currants, Black	—	—	0.00
Currants, Red	—	—	0.02
Dandelion Greens	—	—	0.02
Dewberries	—	—	0.01
Eggplant	0.19	0.03	0.02
Endive	0.11	—	—
Escarole	—	—	0.03
Garlic	0.36	—	—
Gooseberries, Green	—	—	0.09
Kale	0.02	—	0.01
Lambsquarters	—	30.00	—
Leeks	—	—	0.09
Lentils	—	0.02	—
Lettuce	0.33	0.01	0.00
Melons	—	—	0.00
Mushrooms	—	—	0.00
Mustard Greens	—	0.13	0.01
Nectarines	—	—	0.00
Okra	0.05	0.01	0.15
Onion	0.05	0.00	0.00
Parsley	1.70	—	0.10
Parsnips	0.04	0.02	0.01
Peas	0.05	0.01	0.00
Peaches	—	0.00	0.01
Pears	—	—	0.00
Peppers, Sweet	0.04	0.12	0.02
Pokeweed	—	—	0.48
Potatos	0.05	0.02	0.00
Pumpkin	—	0.04	—
Purslane	1.31	1.68	—
Radishes	0.48	0.01	0.00
Raspberries, Black	—	—	0.05
Raspberries, Red	—	—	0.02
Rhubarb (stems)	—	1.34	0.86
Rutabagas	0.03	—	0.02
Shallots	—	0.00	—
Sorrel	—	0.30	—
Spearmint	—	0.00	—
Spinach	0.97	0.66	0.68
Squash	0.02	—	0.02
Strawberries	—	—	0.01
Sweet Potatos	0.24	0.10	0.06
Tomatillos	—	0.05	—
Tomato	0.05	0.03	0.00
Turnips	0.21	—	0.00
Turnip Greens	0.05	—	—
Watercress	0.31	—	0.01

High oxalic acid foods should be avoided by those with kidney disease, kidney stones, rheumatoid arthritis, or gout. To read more about oxalic acid in foods and get a better understanding of this chart visit growingtaste.com.

Wood sorrel is another great plant to link to the periodic table, the formula for oxalic acid is H₂C₂O_4.

Oxalis means ”sharp” in Greek and Sorrel means “acidic” or “sour” in French.

Although wood sorrel has three-lobed leaves, it is not related to the clover which is in the Trifolium family. Those heart shaped leaves belong to the Oxalis family not the clover family.

Here is a photo of white clover leaves, they are more oval shaped.

Shooh, I hope that wasn’t too much info on the science of wood sorrel and oxalic acid; sometimes I just can’t stop myself.

Tags flowers, herbs, nature study, PTOE | Permalink | Comments (16)

activities aluminum craft periodic table tutorial

Aluminum Art Mobile- Periodic Table of Elements

April 17, 2009 – 5:33 pm

For this project you need: heavy duty aluminum foil (we used Reynold’s wrap), permanent markers, rubbing plates, scissors, wire cutters, wire (we used florist wire), pliers, ribbon, beads, bells, glue gun, hole punch and cardboard (from a cereal box).

Place the foil on the rubbing plate, press with your fingers to get the imprint onto the foil, then color with the permanent markers.

To strengthen the foil, I hot glued cardboard to the back of the foil art. Then I punched 4 holes.

To assemble the aluminum art together we discovered it was easier to do this on the floor. We simply wired the pieces together adding beads and aluminum bells between each piece as we went along.

We punched 5 holes to the bottom piece and added a lot of pretty beads and bells.

We added a big ribbon to the top of the mobiles and hung them from our Hawthorn tree.

To give credit where it’s due, I got the idea to hang the aluminum art in a mobile fashion from Pepper paints. To learn more about aluminum visit Aluminum and Literature. Visit Anet at the Purple Squirrel for another idea with aluminum.

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