12-12-2010, 12:26 PM
I'm not a crafter. It's too girly for me. I don't scrapbook or buy ribbons to make shit or get overly excited when I go to Michaels. I do, however, do these things around the holidays to make my family happy:
Borax crystal ornaments:
needed:
*1 box of Twenty Mule Team Borax (buy it on the laundry aisle, in the blue box)
*container of boiling water (do NOT use your nice cookery, this will fuck it up, use an old plastic container to heat the water to boiling in the microwave)
*cheap wooden spoon to mix solution
*chenille wires cut into 3" lengths (pipe cleaners, you can buy the colored ones in the craft aisle at WallyWorld or use the real white kind)
*cheap plastic cups
*thread
*popsicle sticks or pencils/pens you have around the house or sticks (use whatever is long enough to go across the lid of the cup)
1. boil the water and stir in borax until you have a supersaturated solution (when it is supersaturated, borax will start to settle on the bottom and not dissolve, you have enough then)
2. make a Christmas shape or spiral or letter shape using the 3" pipe cleaner. tie the shape at one end of about 10" of thread. wrap the other end of the thread around the stick and hang the wire in a cup until it is about 1⁄4 inch from the bottom of the cup and doesn't touch the sides.
3. pour the borax solution into the cup, covering the ornament, and set aside overnight until the solution cools. the borax will come out of the solution and will cling to the chenille wire.
Colored Fire pinecones
needed:
*pinecones (or sawdust, or old odd bits of cork, or dried pieces of branches)
*bucket of water
*chemical for different colored fire: green~use boric acid, sold at cheap stores (dollar store, dollar general, etc) in powder form as a bug repellent, white~epsom salts (magnesium sulfate), yellowish green~borax, same kind as used in the crystal ornaments, purple~potassium chloride (salt substitute, also used as a water softener, Morton's sells this at WallyWorld or you should be able to get the salt substitute on the spice aisle at the grocery store) orange~calcium chloride (the dessicate used in Damp Rid, also can buy it at auto stores to dry up spills, I think it is also present in some dry bleach check the label)
put enough water in the bucket to cover the pinecones, you don't need to fill the bucket. mix in as much of the ONE chemical (one at a time, unless you want to blow up) as will be absorbed in the water. you may want to heat the water a little, don't boil it. soak pinecones overnight then place on a thick layer of newspaper outside to dry. we throw these on the fire while we are sitting around having our Christmas drink.
What do you make around the holidays?
Borax crystal ornaments:
needed:
*1 box of Twenty Mule Team Borax (buy it on the laundry aisle, in the blue box)
*container of boiling water (do NOT use your nice cookery, this will fuck it up, use an old plastic container to heat the water to boiling in the microwave)
*cheap wooden spoon to mix solution
*chenille wires cut into 3" lengths (pipe cleaners, you can buy the colored ones in the craft aisle at WallyWorld or use the real white kind)
*cheap plastic cups
*thread
*popsicle sticks or pencils/pens you have around the house or sticks (use whatever is long enough to go across the lid of the cup)
1. boil the water and stir in borax until you have a supersaturated solution (when it is supersaturated, borax will start to settle on the bottom and not dissolve, you have enough then)
2. make a Christmas shape or spiral or letter shape using the 3" pipe cleaner. tie the shape at one end of about 10" of thread. wrap the other end of the thread around the stick and hang the wire in a cup until it is about 1⁄4 inch from the bottom of the cup and doesn't touch the sides.
3. pour the borax solution into the cup, covering the ornament, and set aside overnight until the solution cools. the borax will come out of the solution and will cling to the chenille wire.
Colored Fire pinecones
needed:
*pinecones (or sawdust, or old odd bits of cork, or dried pieces of branches)
*bucket of water
*chemical for different colored fire: green~use boric acid, sold at cheap stores (dollar store, dollar general, etc) in powder form as a bug repellent, white~epsom salts (magnesium sulfate), yellowish green~borax, same kind as used in the crystal ornaments, purple~potassium chloride (salt substitute, also used as a water softener, Morton's sells this at WallyWorld or you should be able to get the salt substitute on the spice aisle at the grocery store) orange~calcium chloride (the dessicate used in Damp Rid, also can buy it at auto stores to dry up spills, I think it is also present in some dry bleach check the label)
put enough water in the bucket to cover the pinecones, you don't need to fill the bucket. mix in as much of the ONE chemical (one at a time, unless you want to blow up) as will be absorbed in the water. you may want to heat the water a little, don't boil it. soak pinecones overnight then place on a thick layer of newspaper outside to dry. we throw these on the fire while we are sitting around having our Christmas drink.
What do you make around the holidays?
![[Image: borax+ornament.jpg]](https://4.bp.blogspot.com/_SWa0AzNzBr4/SxV9niEaN_I/AAAAAAAAAC8/fwICmfSgjVE/s1600/borax+ornament.jpg)
![[Image: 1.png]](http://s3.amazonaws.com/curbly_uploads_production/photos/0000/0012/1960/1.png)
![[Image: DSC03532.JPG]](https://2.bp.blogspot.com/_-EQO70dvwgs/TOFvXrXVOjI/AAAAAAAAAKU/P0sqkd0VYsQ/s200/DSC03532.JPG)
![[Image: How-to-make-Borax-crystal-decorations-to-impress-a.jpg]](http://www.instructables.com/image/FH73CYOFOHXAO1H/How-to-make-Borax-crystal-decorations-to-impress-a.jpg)
![[Image: beakers-717179.JPG&t=1]](https://t2.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:jEDuRQtVaHMAIM:http://www.redbrickroad.com/blog/uploaded_images/beakers-717179.JPG&t=1)
