The Giant Dry Ice Bubble Sphere
If you’ve got some dry ice, why not gather friends and family and try your hand at making a large dry ice ghost bubble?This is especially fun at Halloween. Who knows? Maybe you will see your future inside the Ghostly Sphere.
YOU WILL NEED:
- Medium size bowl with a rim
- Small bowl
- Liquid soap
- 20 inch by 2 inch strip of absorbent cloth (cut up t-shirts work great)
- Warm Water
- Dry Ice – Available at some grocery stores and ice suppliers
CAUTION!: NEVER touch dry ice with your bare hands.
Always wear thick gloves and keep away from children.
NEVER place dry ice in a completely enclosed container.
WHAT TO DO:
Fill each bowl halfway with water. In the small bowl, add a good squirt of liquid soap (we like Dawn Concentrate) and stir it up.
Get the rim of the larger bowl wet with regular water using your fingers.
Add the dry ice to the large bowl. Admire the sights and sounds of bubbling dry ice.Now the tricky part, dip the cloth into the soapy water to get it wet but not dripping wet. Pull the cloth strip so that it is taut and pass it across the entire rim of the medium bowl to create a soap bubble “skin” over the bowl. It may take several tries – don’t give up!
Don’t worry about your bubble popping. We think that’s the coolest part!
CLICK HERE FOR MORE FUN HALLOWEEN EXPERIMENT IDEAS!
Make Some Ghost Bubbles!
If you want to make any day better, perhaps the easiest way is to add bubbles to it. We have seen lots of different kinds of bubbles: big bubbles, small bubbles, bubbles that don’t pop, even colored bubbles. But my personal favorite is Ghost Bubbles. They’re not that hard to make and they are great fun to explore…especially at Halloween:
YOU WILL NEED:
- A large plastic container with a wide mouth
- A rubber sink sprayer designed to attach to a faucet with the sprayer cut off/removed. (regular wide tubing, 1 cm or wider will work as well)
- Small bowl of bubble solution. CLICK HERE for a recipe.
- Warm Water
- Dry Ice – Available at some grocery stores and ice suppliers
- A glove made of fuzzy fibers.
CAUTION!: NEVER touch dry ice with your bare hands.
Always wear thick gloves and keep away from children.
NEVER place dry ice in a completely enclosed container.
WHAT TO DO:
- Carefully drill a hole towards the top of the container that is just wide enough to fit the tube.
- Fit the tube into the opening with the wide (faucet end) out as shown in the top picture and secure with tape if needed.
- Fill the container with warm water about 1/4 full.
- Drop several pieces of dry ice into the water and cap the container loosely. Dry ice mist should now be coming out of the tube.
- Dip the end of the tube into the bubble solution and make ghost bubbles! If the mist is coming out too fast, loosen the container cap to adjust the flow.
MORE GHOST BUBBLE FUN:
- Try holding Ghost Bubbles with a fuzzy glove such as a wool glove. With some practice, you can toss and bounce the bubble.
- Allow the bubbles to fall onto a fuzzy surface, such as a towel. Try rolling them around by lifting different ends of the towel. Fuzzy surfaces keep the bubble from easily popping because they spread out the amount of pressure on the surface of the bubble, and keep it from touching a surface that would absorb the moisture and dry out the bubble, causing it to pop.
GHOST BUBBLE INFO:
Every soap bubble is made of a film that has 3 layers: Soap, then Water, then Soap. Because of the way that soap molecules are arranged, and the way they attract and repel from each other and the water, the soap creates bonds that give the water additional strength, and allow them to last much longer. The dry ice mist is a combination of water vapor and carbon dioxide gas from the dry ice. Because carbon dioxide is heavier than air, dry ice mist will always flow downward.
CLICK HERE FOR MORE FUN HALLOWEEN EXPERIMENT IDEAS!
A Density Experiment You Can Drink!
Density is a fascinating and sometimes tricky idea to understand. This Drink of Density will help bring home the idea of density in liquids, not to mention it looks cool when your all done, it’s tasty, and it’s even good for you – what more could you ask for in a science activity!
You will need:
- Juices that have different density levels. (see below for a simple explanation of density) The density of a juice is often determined by how much sugar or fruit is in it – the more sugar or fruit, the more dense the juice is. Powdered and canned juices do not work well for this experiment since they are almost entirely water. You will have to do some experimentation to find juices that are colorful and give a nice display of density, and that’s half the fun.
- A narrow glass (the more narrow it is, the easier it is to separate the density levels)
- Eye dropper or turkey type baster.
What to do:
- Before you begin, you can guess which juices you think will be more dense and form a hypothesis of how the levels of your Drink of Density will turn out. Check the number of ingredients, the sugar content, and the water content to help you out.
- In order to display your density levels, you will need to find out which of your juices are the most and least dense. Pour one of your juices into the narrow glass to fill it about 1 inch (2.5 cm) high. Fill a dropper with another juice and slowly drop it onto the inside of the glass so that it runs down the side of the glass. Watch the juice to see if it goes below or above the juice in there. (if it simply mixes with the juice and does not go above or below, it has the same density as the juice and you will need to move on to your next juice.
- Continue experimenting with other juices to determine which juices go to the bottom (more dense) and which ones go to the top (least dense.)
- Once you have the densities determined, start over with a clean glass and use the dropper for each level to create your final Drink of Density!
Note: In case you were wondering, the juices in the photo are (top) Tropicana Pomegranate-Blueberry, (middle) Tropicana Pure Premium Orange Juice, (bottom) Nature’s Promise White Grape (33 grams of sugar in 6.75 ounces!)
How Does It Work?:
The density of liquids demonstrates the the amount of “stuff” (atoms, mass) that are present in a particular volume of the juice. In other words, if you have cup with 200ml of plain water, and a cup with 200 ml of water that has lots of sugar dissolved in it, the cup of sugar water will be heavier even though they are the same volume of liquid – the invisible sugar molecules are dispersed in the water, making it heavier (more dense.)
Purple Brew: An Acid-Base Indicator
Next time kids say they don’t like vegetables, try out an experiment that will bring out the fun side of our leafy friends. Mom and Kiddo of the blog What Did We Do All Day? shows us how to play with color in this demonstration that uses an acid, a base, and a vegetable. She suggests keeping some of the solution in the fridge for a rainy day and allowing kids to experiment on their own.
You will need:
- purple or red cabbage
- small and large glass jars
- baking soda
- water
- vinegar
- measuring cup
- 1/4 teaspoon
What to do?
- Chop up a cabbage and simmer on the stove for 20 minutes to make a cool purple liquid (kids, please let a grown-up do this)
- After the purple brew has cooled, collect some small and large jars. Place about 1/4 tsp baking soda and 1/4 tsp water in one jar, a small amount of vinegar in another and about 1/4 cup purple brew in a third.
- Put some of the brew in a measuring cup and pour 1/4 tsp of the brew in each of the first small jars. What happens when you mix the purple brew with the different solutions?
- In the jar filled with a 1/4 cup of purple brew, pour about 1/4 cup vinegar. What happens?
- Next, add 1/4 tsp baking soda to the same solution. What is your observation?
How does it work?
Red cabbage contains a chemical called flavin and flavin has the ability to change color based on the pH level of certain liquids. Nuetral solutions, (like water) are purple. Acid solutions, like the vinegar, turn will turn flavin red. Basic solutions, like the baking soda water, become blue.
You can check out Mom and Kiddo’s full post of this experiment HERE. Let us know what your results are when you make your own purple brew. What would happen if you tried different vegetables? What would happen if you used cream of tartar, lemon juice, salt, lemonade, or other materials from your kitchen pantry? Can you make your own litmus paper and test the pH of the solution?
Eggshell Geode Crystals
This project comes to us from Melissa Howard who is a Mom, Blogger, and photographer. This project nicely demonstrates how real-life geodes are formed in igneous and sedimentary rock. It also demonstrates super-saturated solutions and shows a nice variety of crystal shapes and formations.
YOU WILL NEED:
- clean eggshells
- water
- a variety of soluble solids: table salt, rock salt, sugar, baking soda, Epsom salts, sea salt, borax, or cream of tartar
- small heat proof containers (coffee cups work well)
- spoons
- food coloring
- egg cartons and wax paper or mini-muffin tins
WHAT TO DO:
- Crack the eggs for this project as close to the narrow end as possible. This preserves more egg to use as a container for the solution.
- Clean the eggshells using hot water. The hot water cooks the lining and allows you to pull the skin (egg membrane) out of the inside of the egg using your fingers. Make sure to remove all the egg membrane, if any membrane stays inside the shell it is possible that your eggshell will grow mold and your crystals will turn black.
- Use an egg carton lined with waxed paper or mini-muffin tins to hold the eggs upright.
- Use a saucepan to heat the water to boiling. .
- Pour half a cup to a cup of water into your heatproof container. If you poured half a cup of water into the container, add about a ¼ cup of solid to the water. Stir it until it dissolves. Likewise if you used a cup of water, add about ½ a cup of solid to the water. You wanted to add about half again the volume of the water as a solid to the mixture. When the initial amount of solid is dissolved continue adding small amounts of the solid until the water is super-saturated. Super-saturated simply means the water has absorbed all it is able to absorb and any solid you add will not dissolve.
- Add food coloring.
- Carefully pour your solution into the eggshell, filling it as full as possible without over-flowing it or causing it to tip.
Find a safe place to put your shells while the water evaporates. Crystals will form inside the eggshells as the water evaporates.
HOW DOES IT WORK?
Dissolving the crystals in hot water created what is called a “super-saturated solution.” This basically means that the salts took advantage of the energy of the hot water to help them dissolve until there was no more space between molecules in the solution. As the solution cooled, the water lost its energy and the crystals are forced from the solution to become a solid again. Since this happens slowly along with the evaporation, the crystals have time to grow larger than they were when the experiment started. Natural geodes in rock are form in much the same way as mineralized water seeps into air pockets in rock. This is also how rock candy crystals are formed.
You can visit Melissa’s great blog and see more pictures HERE.
Halloween Science Experiments & Ideas!
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GLOWING DRINKABLE BEVERAGES
Did you know that tonic water will glow under a blacklight? We didn’t either. The quinine in the tonic water glows a very cool looking blue color that we really like. If you’re not crazy about the taste of tonic water, try making ice cubes using the tonic water and then add them to a glass of Sprite or another light colored citrus drink. Switch on the blacklight and you have the perfect Halloween beverage. After a few minutes the entire drink will start to glow. (see photo) It works for making glowing Jello as well.
MAKE SOME HALLOWEEN SLIME
Slime and Halloween go together like, well, slime and Halloween. Here’s 2 ways to add a little slime to your October.
DO IT YOURSELF SLIME - If you’ve got a little glue and some powdered borax, you can mix up some slime by following the instructions HERE.
READY TO GO SLIME KITS - If you want to make LOTS of classic slime as an activity for a party or science lesson, or if you have trouble finding Borax, a kit is the way to go. You can find some great slime making kits by clicking HERE.
MAKE SOME GHOST BUBBLES
Ghost Bubbles are regular soap bubbles filled with dry ice mist. If you know the secret you can even hold them in your hand without them popping. Find out how to make Ghost Bubbles by clicking HERE.
EERIE GREEN PUMPKINS 
All your neighbors will have Jack-O-Lanterns that glow orange, but you will impress them with a Jack-O-Lantern that glows green! Best of all, the green glow is simple and safer than traditional candles. Purchase one or two large glowing light-sticks per pumpkin at a party store or hardware store.(We like green, but there are many colors to experiment with) Activate the light stick and simply drop them into the pumpkin, or, to conceal the glow sticks, attach them to the inside of the pumpkin lid by unbending large paperclips to secure them. Place your pumpkin outside on Halloween night and admire the “Oooos” and “Ahhhhs” of Trick-Or-Treaters.
MAKE A HAUNTED, SCREAMING CUP
If you think haunted houses are scary, wait until to hear…haunted drinkware! First, check out our Chicken In A Cup experiment, but instead of pulling along the string in short bursts to sound like a chicken (it really does, trust us) pull in one continuous motion. The result is an eerie screaming cup! The only thing better than than trying the screaming cup yourself, is trying the screaming cup with LOTS of your friends all at once. Parents especially seem to enjoy that. The instructions can be found HERE.
BUBBLING POTIONS AND JARS
Every mad scientist needs some bubbling potions. While dry ice may be the ultimate bubbling potion, the effect tends to be short-lived, and dry ice can be dangerous around younger Halloween party goers. The solution is a simple aquarium pump. Purchase an inexpensive aquarium pump and some tubing at your local pet store along with a line splitter (if you want more than one bubbling potion.) Set up the pump to send bubbles into various large food jars through the tubes. Add some food coloring, plastic bugs or fake body parts, and you’ve got the sights and sounds of a mad scientists lab that will last all night. For added drama, light up the jars from below using flashlights. You can also create floating eyeballs by drawing an iris and pupil onto ping-pong balls with permanent markers. Make a few that will float around by drilling two very small holes in the ping-pong balls and allowing them to fill with water until they sink. For an added glowing black light effect add our Glow-Bright Concentrate.
GHOST BUBBLE SPHERE
If you have got some dry ice around this Halloween, gather your friends and family and try making a Dry Ice Bubble Sphere. It’s easy, and the result will wow anyone at your party. Get all the instructions HERE.
THE STATIC DANCING GHOST
Make a paper ghost seem to rise at your command an even dance around
CLICK HERE for instructions to make a static powered dancing ghost.
THE SCREAMING QUARTER EXPERIMENT
If you have some dry ice from the Ghost Bubble Sphere left over, you might want to try this fun little demonstration. Dry ice is the solid form of carbon dioxide. As it sublimates, (turns back into a gas) the carbon dioxide gas escapes around the quarter causing the quarter to vibrate and make a rather spooky shrill along with occasional humorous sounds. Always wear gloves when performing this demonstration.
CHECK OUT THE HALLOWEEN SCIENCE ITEMS AT OUR STORE, CLICK HERE.
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