Going Geek with my Girls (Science Style)

I love going geek with my kids. Science experiments are just so much fun. This morning we did two that were color "explosions".

For the first, I used the supplies to make home made volcanoes, but used different colored food coloring. It's fun not matter what color, right? I got two clear jars out of my pantry, filled them a little less than half way with distilled white vinegar, mixed a little food coloring in, and a dab of dish soap. Then I set up the work space and got the girls. They were a little confused but super excited when I said "Science Experiment". I gave them both a work station, and then a small cup that had about a table spoon or so of baking soda in it. They did the pouring and....

Boy did they enjoy the results. I love this picture of Noelle. She has this look on her face that says "what in heaven's name just happened here?" I must have given her more of something because her reaction was more dramatic and much more rapid than her older sisters.
A view of both of them.

Melanie says "Look mom, it's a gooey geyser"

They had so much fun with it... we did it again, with different colors.

Speaking of more colors, that leads us into the next experiment. What you would need for this one is a glass pan of some sort, warm milk (this is important, and I think it's because cold milk's particulars don't move as fast as warm milks. But it doesn't have to be hot, just warm), food coloring, and dish soap. I put a shallow layer of milk into a glass pan. Then we randomly placed color throughout.

Oh so pretty!

Then, when you are ready for the fun to begin. Add a drop of dish soap into the milk. This is a picture the second after I made one drop. In fact, you can almost see exactly where the drop was made.

Make a few drops and you will see a lot of fun color swirls.

Melanie told me it's almost like fireworks, but in the milk!

So, in case you want to know the science between the two experiments, here you go.

Experiment 1: The vinegar is an acid, the baking soda is a base. Acid and bases, when combined, they neutralize each other, forming water and a salt. This reaction is instant and dramatic! (the soap wasn't part of the reaction as it just makes everything a little more sudsy)

Experiment 2: Milk has two substances in it: water and fat, which do not mix. So, even though it looks like 1 completely mixed liquid, it truly is not. But soap has the ability to mix with both water AND fat. So, once you put the soap into the milk, one end of the soap particle will attach it's self to the water, and the other end to the fat. It causes this mixing effect. So cool!