salt crystals

We grew salt crystals,
first we boiled them on the stove and then set
them in a window for 2 weeks.
The pictures are the progression of
the salt crystals we grew.

sugar crystals

sugar crystals

The crystals had formed by the next morning. They taste good.

Here are our orange and green rock candy experiments.

Some of Song's Rock Collection

 

This is a "Rhode' onit


    These are a few of Song's rocks from her collection. The first it called a "Rhode"onite. The second is an ice quarts, since we were talking about hardness, and the quarts are very hard. The third is a rose quarts, and there are tons of different types of quarts, by the way. The fourth is a hematite, since we were talking about streak marks, I read that it's streak mark is supposed to be red-ish, but since mine is polished, it has sealed it all together, so it won't drop anything to leave a streak mark. The last one, that's one of my favorite one; a tiger's eye; it's called a tiger's eye because if you look closely, there are sort of golden and black stripes, like in a tiger's eye.
 

This is a ice quarts


 


 

This is the Hematite, this picture is also a little dark, but it looks like a lot like iron


  

This is a tiger's eye, can you see the stripes? A real tiger's eye looks a lot like this, with very similar stripes



caterpillars and rocks...

We did get to see several caterpillars in our local area and photographed a couple as seen above. We also saw beautiful monarchs migrating South through our local area this past month. Our grandmother has a butterfly garden and it's beautiful to watch the monarchs land for a rest. We also attended a rock and mineral show this past month. Pictured above are some of the pics we took at the show. Eoghan loves collecting rocks and gems! - Orla and Eoghan

Crystals My Sister Gave Me - Ben K.

My sister, Olivia, went on a field trip to a Geology Museum. She bought these rocks for me in the gift shop, because she knew I was learning about crystals and rocks.

This is a White Quartz

This is an Iron Pyrite or
more commonly known as
"FOOLS GOLD"!

Ben K. Crystal Growing Project

Making My Crystals:

This is my crystal growing kit.
I grew blue and green crystals.
I used Ein-O Crystal Kits.

First I mixed the solution.
I put the rocks in the container.

I poured the crystal growing solution
on the rocks and then
I waited....

Here are the crystals growing
for two weeks.

The Final Result!

Green Crystals

Blue Crystals

These are the final product of Anna and Rebekah's butterflies. The first one with the white tissue is our first butterfly that emerged. Unfortunately she only lived one day and never could really fly. We were not sure what was wrong. The next caterpillar we got on our next batch of crown flower leaves. He grew healthy and strong and emerged this past Monday morning. We got to watch the process! We released him on Tuesday because he was so big we thought he would happier out in the world. We plan to get our own crown flower tree and watch them year round!

My butterflies arrived and went into chrysalis
stage within a week. I had 3 that attached themselves
to the paper, and one that fell down. I wasn't sure
if the one that fell down would be okay, but I left it alone
and it hatched out fine. The butterflies hatched one a day for
3 days, then, the last one didn't hatch for another 3 days.
I let them fly away after a few days of feeding them orange slices.

Time our friends to move on....first smell of fresh air and then the big release.

Our butterfly hut and a picture of our butterfly lap books. This was a very nice unit with a wonderful class with Mrs. Rhodes. The recorded class was a great reference for us.

They're here!!

Waiting to hatch. You can almost see the outline of the painted lady in the chrysalis.

Our Butterfly Adventure

Our caterpillars going into J formation and a chrysalis.

Anna and Rebekah's caterpillars to date. We lost a caterpillar yesterday, Sept. 21. So we are down to two.

Aaron's Butterflies

The first one hatches during class.
If you look closely you can see the one on the disc emerging.
You can almost see the one on the left emerging.

Painted Ladies.

A better view of the hatching butterfly.

We put a plant into the habitat after noticing them breeding. It will be interesting to see if they laid any eggs.

Release day.