little green fingers

How to grow magic roots

(Photograph: Kate Whitaker)

This project from 101 Brilliant Things for Kids to do with Science falls under the 'indoor gardening' category - which, given the vagaries of Easter weather, is no bad thing.

You Will Need:

Scissors

Suitable plant

Small clear container

Water

Pots (optional)

Potting compost (optional)

Plants are pretty good at making lots more of themselves - and not just from seeds. In fact they can quite often grow new roots from a tiny snipped off stem which is a bit like growing a new pair of feet out of a tiny finger - except much less weird.

Usually this clever work goes on under the ground but some plants will let you peek at what they do because they'll even produce new roots in water. If you want to watch the magic in action, first you'll need to find some suitable plants to snip. Many herbs are good to try such as rosemary, mint, sage, tarragon, lemon balm, thyme and oregano.

Cut about 15cm from the end of a plant stem without flowers, strip off any leaves on the bottom half and then place this 'cutting' in a small container of water on a sunny windowsill. It's good to find a container with a slightly narrower top as this will help hold the stem upright.

You should change the water every few days so it stays fresh - you can use tap water but rainwater is even better as it contains less chemicals and more nutrients.

Amazingly within 2-6 weeks (depending on the plant) you should start to see roots begin to grow out of the base of the stem. You can keep them this way, harvesting their new leaves if they are herbs, or else carefully plant them in small pots of compost and try growing them on.

Tip: Unlike leaves, roots prefer to grow away from light so you could use darker glass containers or even wrap some paper around the container.

If you haven't caused enough mayhem yet:

Why not try taking other leaf, root or stem cuttings from different plants and see how many you can grow. Which do better - those in water or those in potting compost? Why do you think this is?

The Sciencey Bit

Roots which grow from somewhere other than the original seed or from the main root itself are called adventitious roots. When plants are grown from other parts of a plant such as a stem, leaf or root cutting this is called vegetative propagation and results in the plants being genetically identical to their parents

How to crystallise flowers

Photography: Kate Whitaker

This is one of the projects from my new book - 101 Brilliant Things for Kids to do with Science.  Considering this book took me half of last year to write and nearly killed me in the process, I have been rather remiss about mentioning it on this blog. This is because I bought a pub with some friends and got distracted (yes really).

Still, with the Easter holidays upon us I thought I might share a few of the more garden-related projects from the book on my blog.  The first is one of my favourite, touching as it does on both flowers and cakes.

As with all my books, the projects are aimed directly at the kids - because let's face it, who wants grown ups getting involved and spoiling the fun. Oh and there is some actual science involved too so we can all feel terribly educated whilst still munching on cakes.

You Will Need:

Edible flowers

Caster sugar

Container

Shallow bowl or plate

Bowl

Egg white

Water

Fork

These brilliant cake decorations will make everyone gasp and say 'wow - those flowers look almost real'. This gives you two equally appealing options: either look smug and take the praise or roll your eyes, sigh and say "that's because they are real... obviously".

But before you get to this happy stage you need to prepare your crystallising station. Place your separated egg white in a bowl, add a tablespoon of water and whisk this gently for a minute with a fork to break it up a bit. Then put out a container with some caster sugar in it, a plate or shallow bowl and a piece of greaseproof paper.

Next go and pick a few edible flowers, ensuring they are clean and dry - rose and sunflower petals work well, as do violas, primroses, cornflowers, pansies, pelargoniums and borage. Just make sure you get an adult to double check you have the right flowers and if in doubt - don't use them (some flowers are actually poisonous!).

Now grip the flower by the stalk or, if you are working on petals, carefully hold one end between your finger and thumb. Use a small clean paintbrush to coat all the surfaces - front and back - in a thin layer of the egg white mixture.

Take a pinch of caster sugar and sprinkle this over the flower until it's covered then lay it, very carefully, face down, on the greaseproof paper. In an hour or two it will have become quite solid and you can check for any uncoated bits you need to redo.

After you've let the flowers dry for a day you can carefully remove any stalks or sepals that are left on and then use the flowers to decorate cakes and puddings. And if you have any left over you can store them for a few weeks between sheets of greaseproof paper in an airtight container. After all it's always good to have a few 'so-impressive-you'll-gasp' decorations to hand - just in case you need that lovely smug feeling. 

If you haven't caused enough mayhem yet:

Why not try crystallizing some edible leaves? Mint leaves are ideal and look great alongside the flowers.

The Sciencey Bit

Bacteria and fungi would usually cause these flowers to decay and rot but to stay alive they need water. Sugar is a hygroscopic substance, which means it draws water molecules from the flowers by absorption, stopping the bacteria and fungi doing their work.

How to grow cress initials

I need some cheering up. Between hard Brexits and orange presidents, it's not looking like a good week.

Usually I rely on my garden for solace but it's either too wet, too cold, or just too January for my liking. Thankfully the new world order has yet to rob me of windowsills, and there are no swingeing tariffs on cress seeds, or cotton wool... yet. So I have cheered myself by trialling some child-friendly seed sowing ideas for this bleakest of months.

This is perfect for kids - not only is it very easy, it gives quick results and uses their own initial so panders to the egotistical view of all small children (and possibly Presidents-in-waiting).

First you need a gravel tray or, even better, a colourful plastic plate.

Next get the children to take long sections of cotton wool and mould them into the shape of their initial on the plate.  If they wet the cotton wool this makes it hold in place far more easily.

Place some cress seeds in a  small bowl or on a plate so the children can take pinches between their thumb and forefinger. They then need to hold this very close to the cotton wool before sprinkling it on.

Finally, place the plate on a sunny windowsill and make sure it doesn't dry out by dribbling water onto the plate for the cotton wool to absorb.

In about a week they should have cress seeds which can be snipped or pulled up to use in salads and sandwiches.

Oh, and there's no reason this method won't work just as well for micro leaves so you could even spell out a whole name in cotton wool with a different crop on each.  Good seeds to try are basil, broccoli, beetroot, cabbage, chard, chervil, chicory, coriander, dill, fennel, kale, kohl rabi, mibuna, mizuna, mustard, orach, pak choi, radish, rocket, sorrel or spinach.

Cake decorating with edible flowers

My daughter has big ideas. Lots of them. This is brilliant and I love her for it.  The only downside is I often get dragged into these ideas and, quite frankly, they're exhausting.

Take last week for example.

"Mummy, can we make some cupcakes? Archie wants to take them in for everyone in drama club.  You know... for his birthday."

I should point out that Archie didn't seem aware that he wanted to do this and showed no interest in taking part but Ava was enthusiastic so I thought it wouldn't do any harm knocking up a dozen little cakes.

"We'll need 48."

"What!"

"And they'll need decorating."

As I said... exhausting.

Thankfully, I had just taken delivery of Petal, Leaf, Seed - a new book by my friend Lia Leendertz. It's utterly gorgeous and full of inspiring recipes using... well.... petal, leaves and seeds not surprisingly.  But what caught my eye was a beautiful petal cake. Genius, I thought, we can decorate using flowers!

In her recipe Lia used marigold and cornflower petals but we're a little early in the season for those. Thankfully she has a section going through all sorts of edible flowers and I realised that my garden was full of one of them - forget-me-nots.

So we topped the cakes with a little butter icing and the children set up a production line picking off the tiny blue flowers and dotting them on the cake. As Lia says, fresh flower decorations need eating the same day or they will shrivel up and look less appetising but, surprise, surprise all 48 cakes were consumed in a morning.

"That went down really well. We should do it again!"

I ignored her.

How to make a plant pot bird feeder (with added bling)

They dress up in feathers, show off with mid air stunts and screech at the top of their voices in the early hours of every morning - so don't try and tell me birds aren't total divas.

And divas, as we know, like nothing more than a bit of show off bling which is why they'll love this bird feeder (probably). It might also pull in few extra visitors this weekend for you to record on the RSPB Great Garden Birdwatch (it only takes an hour and is a great way to get the kids watching, identifying and recording birds).

1. Ask the children to wash out some small garden pots (you could use plastic ones, but terracotta look a wee bit classier) - preferably outside in an old bucket or basin.

2. When they have dried, use acrylic paint to add colour to the rim of the pot.

3. Thread a long piece of ribbon twice through the hole at the base of the pot and round again, leaving plenty at both ends to tie it to a branch or bracket. If you're not a fan of 'bling' you could go for twine or string instead.

4. Make up your bird food mix: in a bowl add a block of lard to two cups of porridge oats, one of flour and one of bird seed mix.  Provided the lard is at room temperature, the children can mix it all together by squishing with their hands and you don't need to heat anything on the stove.

5. Squish the bird food mix into the pot until it reaches the top (you should have enough mix for 2-3 pots depending on their size).

6. For added decoration (and treats) you can also tie some clusters of berries to the ribbon above the pot - or even some painted pinecones.

7. Hang your feeder from a branch or wall bracket and wait for the birds to visit. This fat-based snack is particularly popular with tits, thrushes and wrens but they are often wary of new objects so may take a day before they start to visit this new feeder. Then again, they may simply shun it because it doesn't have enough sequins. Sheesh - divas!

 

How to grow a garden from scraps

(Photo: Kyle Books/Rachel Warne)

Today on the blog, I give you number 55 from my 101 Things For Kids To Do On A Rainy Day (available at all good bookstores... obviously) - Grow a garden from scraps.

You Will Need

Sunny windowsill

Food scraps

Saucers, bowls and small plant pots

Compost

Water

Jug or small watering can

Grown-ups have a habit of throwing away useful stuff - especially in the kitchen. In fact almost any time they go near fruit and vegetables something goes to waste. Well now you can teach them some better habits by showing how to grow new plants from their scraps.

Find a nice sunny windowsill where you can house your garden - sunshine is completely essential to plants (very much like sweets are to children).

You should then hover over your parents' shoulders every time they are preparing something to eat. They will of course find this spectacularly annoying but that's nothing new.

If they're chopping up celery, ask to keep the bottom section when they have cut it off. Pop this in a shallow dish of water and in a few days it will start to regrow from the centre. Also if you save the ends of spring onions you can stack these in a small glass, with the roots at the bottom, give them some water, and you'll have more leaves to snip off in a couple of weeks. Plus any cut off tops of root vegetables like carrots, beetroots, turnips, radishes can be put on a saucer in some water and they will start to regrow.

And when your mum or dad say "Oh dear" as they pull out the vegetable basket, that's your cue to grab things. Onions that have started to sprout or garlic cloves past their best can be planted in a pot of stones. Just water up to the base of these 'bulbs' and they'll start producing leaves which will taste of - well onion and garlic not surprisingly, and which you can snip with scissors to add to your cooking.

And don't forget, any leftover seeds and pips from fruit can be put into a small plant pot of compost to see if they'll grow. Just make a hole with your finger, pop in the seed, cover it over and give it a water.

Tip: Remember to keep your scrap garden watered - this is the other essential thing for plants (very much like ice cream is for children...)

How to make colour changing drinks

Picture copyright: Kyle Books/Rachel Warne

Today on the blog, I have the most exciting thing you can do with a cabbage.  It's also a project taken from my new book - 101 Things For Kids To Do On A Rainy Day.  

You Will Need:

Red cabbage

Bowls

Boiling water (grown ups to use)

Sieve

Clear jug

Clear glasses

Lemonade

This is a great trick to freak out your friends and family - plus you can have lots of fizzy drinks because they will ask you to show you this trick again and again.  And if that's not enough to make you love science I don't know what will. 

First you need to make some coloured cabbage water. Rip up a couple of red cabbage leaves into small pieces, put these in a bowl and ask a grown up to pour on some boiling water so the leaves are just covered.  Leave it to cool for 20 minutes then drain off the juice by pouring it through a sieve into another bowl.

Now put the liquid into a clear jug and stir in a level teaspoon of bicarbonate of soda - this should make the liquid a bright blue colour.  If it still looks a little purple, add more bicarbonate of soda and stir again.  Finally place it in the fridge to chill for half an hour or so.

Now, to freak out your friends...

All you need to do is pour them some lemonade into a clear glass before offering to top it up with your 'magic colour changer'.  Now with as much dramatic flair as you can muster, pour just a very small amount of your blue liquid into the fizzy drink and watch it turn... pink!

Picture copyright: Kyle Books/Rachel Warne

If you want to reveal to them how it works, explain that the cabbage has a special pigment in it (an anthocyanin) that changes colour depending on how acid or alkaline something is.  Bicarbonate of soda makes the mixture alkaline - and blue - but the acidity in the lemon or lime based drink turns it pink.

Then again you could explain nothing... and keep freaking them out.  That sounds like a much better plan if you ask me.

Tip: For an even stronger colour you can mix a quarter teaspoon of citric acid into the lemonade - just make sure you stir it well until it's completely dissolved.

 

I even have a video if you want to see the magic 'in action'.

 

 

 

Growing windowsill garlic

It is difficult to inspire children to garden in the winter.

No scratch that.  It's difficult to inspire anyone to garden in the winter.

The list of 'jobs to do this month' are a little sad in November, thin in December and downright depressing by January.  They mostly involve secateurs and the phrase 'dead, damaged and diseased' which is enough to dampen anyone's gardening ardour. 

So I've decided to embrace windowsill gardening for the next few weeks - it's warmer, nearer the kettle and a lot more rewarding for the kids.

I've partly been inspired by Don't Throw It: Grow It! by Deborah Peterson and Millicent Selsam - a book I was sent a few months ago but which has really come into its own now I'm reluctant to leave the house.  It's a useful handbook on the many things you can grow from garden scraps and the kids and I are trialling a few at a time.

One of the first things we did was plant some garlic cloves.  I had a few past their best languishing at the bottom of the veg basket so I figured - why not give them a go?  I had a glass bowl and some small stones leftover from our paperwhite bulbs at Christmas so we were able to recycle both. We put in four cloves, base plates downwards, pointy ends up, filled around with more stones and watered them up to the base.  

We had shoots within a week and now have very impressive garlic leaves growing healthily on the kitchen windowsill.  The glass bowl is useful because it allows the children to see how much water there is and when it needs topping up.  They can also clearly see the roots.

I have never been a massive fan of growing garlic in the ground - it's always seemed like a very long wait and who needs that much garlic anyway - but this activity is perfect for kids.  No, they won't be growing large garlic bulbs but they will be able to understand that garlic does indeed 'grow' and, best of all, the garlicky shoots are a lot easier for the kids to use in cooking.  Even very young children can use rounded craft scissors to cut bits off the leaves which can then be used to flavour things like stir fries, curries and soups. 

Top 10 Christmas garden activities for children

Of course some might equally entitle this blog post "recycling old stuff" but, hey, those people are cynics: accurate cynics, but cynics none the less. What's more, they're not getting a mince pie.  There! That should teach them.

For the rest of you reindeer-hugging, egg-nog quaffing, snowflake-fanciers, I give you my favourite Christmas (ish) things to do with the kids that are all sort of garden or growing-based (you can see why that didn't quite make it as the blog title).

1. Grass head elves - make them, sow them, cut their hair in amusing styles (featured in Garden Crafts For Children) - equally good with cress (as pictured)

2. Child friendly wreaths - wreaths that are easy for children to make, rather than wreaths that befriend children (in case you were wondering) - and number 59 from 101 Things For Kids To Do Outside

3. Ice mobiles - Cupcake moulds, berries and a love of glitter - you'll need them all for this activity (featured in Garden Crafts for Children)

4. Seed cards - simply add red and green backgrounds and a white central shape (as pictured) to adapt this for a Christmas theme (featured in Garden Crafts For Children)

5. Make snow lanterns - okay so you need some snow, but it is getting rather chilly outside (number 95 from 101 Things For Kids To Do Outside)

6. Pinecone bird feeder - a decorative version features in Garden Crafts For Children but equally you can use this recipe to fill all sorts of containers, as a very young Archie can prove.

7. Paint snow - don't worry, temperatures are dropping... rapidly (number 98 from 101 Things For Kids To Do Outside)

8. Sow microleaves - sow into old pots, or equally create your very own microleaves farm using an old wine box (as featured in Garden Crafts For Children)

9. Decorate wellies - it's a lot more fun to go outside with some personalised puddle stompers (number 89 from 101 Things For Kids To Do Outside)

10. Make Twig Stars - red stems from dogwood make wonderful Christmas decorations when you connect them using garden twine or wire.  You can even learn how to bend your own five-pointed star with no wire needed at all (number 100 from 101 Things For Kids To Do Outside)

What's that you say?  Why yes, I guess you're right - 101 Things for Kids To Do Outside and Garden Crafts For Children would make perfect Christmas presents. Here.  Have a mince pie.  With genius ideas like that, you deserve it.

 

Making eggshell gardens

I have been planting up eggshells.

Yes, I know that sounds weird.  Well actually it is a little weird, but I have to admit I'm rather taken with our miniature eggshell planters.

It is actually something I saw in a book - Teeny Tiny Gardening by Emma Hardy - and which I have shamelessly copied.

I love it because it's so simple, yet still gorgeous to look at.  In her book Emma uses pastel coloured eggs.  I did think I might dye mine with food colouring, but then decided I prefered the plain old biscuit-coloured hen's eggs.

This makes a great children's garden activity too.  Although the eggs are a little delicate for most pre-schoolers, older children should be fine. Also, their smaller fingers are a positive bonus when it comes to planting.

I part-filled the empty eggshell with a little compost - you could sieve it to make it finer but I didn't feel it was necessary.  Also, Emma recommends adding drainage with some pin holes, but my eggshells seem to self-drain quite effectively.

The one issue you might have is in finding something to place in the shell but for me this is the best part: you can ask the children to look for tiny self seeded plants.  It makes them really observant in a garden, peering right down on the ground.  It's easy for us as my Breedon gravel pathways are the perfect environment for plants (and, sadly, weeds) to sow and grow, which means I'm inundated with tiny specimens.  We used apline strawberry, Alchemilla mollis, alpine dog violet and a forget-me-not.  However, there's no reason children couldn't put some annual weeds in these eggshells too - there are plenty around, many are very attractive, and there's not the worry of them spreading when they're growing on your windowsill.

You place the roots into the pot, fill around with compost, pressing down gently as you go, and then finish off the top with a little moss (again, gathered from pathways).

Given the size, these are very much temporary planters, but it's easy enough to pot on the plants when they have become too large (although not the weeds... obviously). You won't even have to worry about getting them out the pot: if they get stuck you can just use the Humpty Dumpty method.