Seths Laboratory - Elephant's Toothpaste.

Don't you just hate those awkward moments in life...

You've got this elephant at home and the poor thing has the dirtiest teeth you have ever seen but you don't have the sufficient paste to clean them!!! what do you do???

Luckily in one of Seth's science books there is an experiment to make 'Elephants Toothpaste', so as soon as Seth was out of school today we rushed home, put on our Lab wear and hit Seth's Laboratory ready for an early evening of Science. I'd set everything up ready apart from one ingredient which i had left to Mrs M to sort (more about that later).

  

For this experiment we needed:

• Empty plastic bottle
• 120ml hydrogen peroxide (no greater than 3-6 concentration)
• Washing up liquid
• Food colouring
• Dry yeast
• Hot water
• Funnel
• Baking tray or shallow pan

we placed the empty bottle in the shallow pan to avoid unnecessary mess and using the funnel we poured the hydrogen peroxide in to the bottle. We then added a few drops of food colouring (the colour isn't important), followed by a few drops of washing up liquid.

This is when we ran in to a problem... the one ingredient that Mrs M was left to sort out (Dry Yeast) was missing and in its place an empty box. So off to Asda i went as Seth has been desperate to do this experiment for weeks. It didn't take me long and i managed to grab some ingredients for future experiments. When i got back Seth put a teaspoon of dry yeast into a beaker along with two table spoons of hot water (not boiling). He then stirred it and added it to the bottle.

At this point Seth's science book says 'The liquid starts bubbling before producing a foam that SPURTS out of the bottle's neck'...

Sadly nothing but disappointment. Turns out we had used a bottle that was far to big so while we patiently waited for the 'spurting' to happen we decided to start from scratch.

So, same experiment smaller bottle and we changed the food dye colour as the colour hadn't come out in the first experiment. 

The experiment turned out a lot better, but Seth being the very serious scientist that he is he still wasn't completely satisfied...

 See... Serious face! i told you!

Seth then decided he was going to add the two experiments together...

Turns out it was just the catalyst we needed to get the 'spurting' in motion

And there you go, the spurting of a toothpaste like substance fit for our elephant and his poor dental hygiene.

"A scientist in his laboratory is not a mere technician: he is also a child confronting natural phenomena that impress him as though they were fairy tales."

The past few weeks have been hectic, were usually so organised around Christmas time but because of the holiday late in the year by the time we got back we had loads to do, plus we've been re-tiling the kitchen and painting the house. If you are a regular reader you'll know that for the past 2 weeks we've dropped off the radar a little. Christmas has passed now, Mrs M is back at work and I've got some serious catching up to do.

A few weeks ago I wrote a post about Seth's Christmas list and how he hadn't asked for anything for himself but wanted Santa to give his presents to homeless children. It was so sweet of him and  the letter will be cherished. Well we made some donations and helped out at the local food bank which we will continue to do. Although Seth's jesture was truly amazing it did leave us in the position of not knowing what to get him. 

Myself and Mrs M had a chat one night and she came up with a great idea which we put into action straight away. Seth loves anything science, he could happily sit all day doing experiments and mixing chemicals (safe ones of course), so we thought it would be a really nice surprise on Christmas morning to wake up to his very own laboratory. 

We had so much fun organising things without him knowing and even managed to paint him a huge blackboard using chalkboard paint on his wall and kept it hidden a whole week before Christmas. It was touch and go a few times when we though he might rumble us but it all worked out and was kept hidden until the big day.

We found some great science things for gifts that we knew would go great in his lab and we were both really excited about setting things up while he was asleep waiting for Santa's arrival. Our Christmas Day was on Boxing Day due to Seth not being with us on Christmas morning so on Christmas morning while most people were opening their gifts we were putting the finishing touches on Seth's big surprise. A few nights back a light bulb went off in my head and I though 'I wonder if there is an 'Se' on the periodic table?' I was about 75% sure there was a 'Th' and thought it would be great to use them on the design. Luckily I was right and selenium was right up there with Thorium, it was obviously meant to be. 

On Christmas night we went to a party at Laura's folks and we took our good friend Chris with us which worked out great as he was there to give me a hand when we got home moving Seth's furniture out while he was sleeping. I had been stressing that we wouldn't get away with it as there was a huge unit to move out but we were surprisingly quiet moving it. We spent the next hour setting it up with beakers full of colourful liquids and various science equipment.

Bless Seth, when he woke up in the morning he wasn't sure what it was in the dark but after waking us up we followed him in and let some light into the room. He was a very excited boy and has been sitting at his desk ever since looking quite chuffed with himself. Theres no shortage of chemicals to mix and specimens to examine, its a mini scientists dream come true and Seth has been making the most of it.

In the past few days we have built a windmill (although we are yet to get it to work), had an Alchemy session (okay maybe that's a little OTT were no where near the discovery of the elixir of life just yet, we'll just call it chemical mixing) and Seth and Mrs M made their own bouncy balls (very clever). We've got plenty of experiments lined up for over the holiday and now we have the space and materials for Seth to let his scientific mind run wild.

The whole thing including the desk and fittings cost under £100 which was great and the look on Seths face was priceless. Its so important to get involved with the things that your children are interested in and although for Seth this is a great present its also a great way for us to spend even more quality time as a family.

Of course we couldn't leave little Opeie out, what could we have done for him to wake up to on his Christmas morning? Click here to find out.

NaturePaint the Eco friendly way to home decoration.

If you have clicked on any of the 'Mrs M' links on my posts then you will know from her blog that as a family we try to be as eco friendly as we can. We're picky when it comes to the food we buy and we use products that have as little unnatural ingredients as we can find. We think its really important to limit the amount of chemicals that we come into contact with especially when it comes to the food we consume.

We're always looking for new products that fit in with our ethos, so when we stumbled upon 'NaturePaint' we were really interested in the product and the background of the company. Seth's bedroom needed refreshing so we decided to use Nature paint to paint one of his walls. After receiving a colour chart through the post we decided on 'Butcher's broom' and we were really excited about receiving it. We received it a few weeks back but decided to wait to paint his wall in the Easter holiday as the paint is non toxic and perfectly safe for both boys to use and we wanted them to get involved.

Seth was desperate to get painting the first day of the Easter holiday but we held off until a few days back. The paint comes in powder form which you have to mix with water which is great because it means it can be sent through the post. So while Mrs M was mixing the paint me and the boys taped off the walls and put sheets down. Seth then put on one of my old shirts and rolled up the sleeves ready for action. (reminded me of when i was in junior school and i used to wear one of my grandads old shirts for my art activities).

 I botched a DIY paint mixer to help Mrs M with the mixing.

 Seth had asked if he could paint some pictures on the wall before covering it so as it was safe for them to mess about with we gave them free reign...

We explained to Seth about the paint being non toxic and the first thing he said was "does that mean i can put my hands in it". Well who are we to stop a child's experiments...(plus we knew it was safe).

Seth's next question... i bet you can guess?? "can you eat it?" As i said before "Well who are we to stop a child's experiments...".

Obviously i didn't eat it and i wouldn't advise anyone to try it but when speaking to a representative of NaturePaint we were told that they also wouldn't advise it but if it was to be accidently consumed it would in fact be harmless. That's the thing that sold it for me.

Anyway back to the job in hand, Now I'm going to be honest, I'm not usually the pessimist but when i saw how much paint was in the bucket i was concerned that there wasn't going to be enough there to paint the entire wall. with paints we have had before we have needed to slap loads up for the coverage that we want but with NaturePaint the pigment is so strong that all we needed was a single thin layer of paint and then we went along and filled in any bits of white that were showing though. These i think were only showing through because of the quality of the rollers we were using.

I really don't say this very often but i have been genuinely impressed by this product, Its safe, the colours are amazing quality, you need a lot less of it compared to other brands and there was no lingering after smell meaning we were comfortable with Seth sleeping in his room that night. It only seems like something silly but at the end of our painting session the thing that impressed me were the tray and bucket we used, I love painting but hate cleaning these things when all the painting is done but when left, the paint drys and can be peeled off like paper leaving your trays and buckets clean and the waste is fully biodegradable, also the packaging is 100% recyclable. Absolutely AMAZING!!!

The end result looked amazing and really made the room, the colour is so vibrant and as i said before i was genuinely impressed and Seth couldn't wait to play in his new room. Its really got us thinking about adding a bit of colour to other rooms in the house. Our bedroom definitely needs a bit of a makeover, we're thinking maybe Damselfly it looked like a great colour on the colour chart.

If your also worried about toxic chemicals or just want to make a safe environment for your children then i would definitely recommend this product its opened our eyes to worry free decorating.

To view more of their great products visit their website http://www.naturepaint.com/