Rainforest model

As part of our habitat study, Imogen and Genevieve created this rain forest model inside a box.

Originally we were going to do animals and plants from rain forests all over the world, which is where the bamboo came from, but in the end, all the animals ended up being from the Amazon. 

Our Anaconda. 

A sloth (on the left) and a howler monkey (on the right). 

An anteater in the foreground and a giant armadillo behind him.  

The harpy eagle is Imogen's newly found "favorite bird". 

The jaguar lurks in the background.

They are already planning out what their desert model will look like. 

When Chemistry Goes Wrong

We've been having a lot of fun mixing things up lately. But this did not go well. I followed these instructions to make a polymer bouncing ball. I followed the instructions very carefully. But hey, maybe I did something wrong. Because that picture didn't even remotely resemble what we got. 

The website said if we used clear glue, we would get translucent balls. But the corn starch made them opaque.

They were sticky and weird feeling but eventually the stickiness went away as we kneaded it. But it never had the smooth surface of a regular bouncy ball. But it did bounce. 

This was the general reaction to the weird balls.

Our complete failure to make Gak was more amusing and was also caused by my misreading the directions. We will try this one again. 

Density

I got this idea here. But I didn't do as many layers. 

We started with honey for our bottom layer. 

Dish soap. 

Vegetable oil

We forgot that water was more dense than oil, so when we poured the water (dyed green) it of course when right through the oil. We dyed the rubbing alcohol orange and put that layer on top. Even tipping the bottle and swirling it around gently did not mix the liquids. 

Testing which evaporates faster. Water (green) or rubbing alcohol (yellow). 

Fake Spring

Our yard is covered with these flowers every spring. We've had enough strangely warm days that they are popping up early this year. 

I find them everywhere, from my children's hair to tucked into the door handles on my car. 

Paint is a regular part of our day

We are doing a habitat study now and through this next week at least. This is a subject our library has lots of resources on and I was able to request stacks of books from them. 

"What? Can't you see I'm busy, Mom?"

Believe it or not, my table does get cleared off on a regular basis. But it takes no time at all before you can't see it buried under all our school stuff again. 

Pet chickens

We went to a friend's house to hang out and they had chickens who were very friendly.