Ooh, I think we did those in chemistry once, too. You have to let them "grow" for quite a while, no?
Nah in this case it just comes out of solution super fast.
I think I made those today. Ours were all white though (not pink). My chem teacher told me to collect the white crystals....and since all of mine were white I pretty much ruined the compound do to the mixing of like 3 different compounds. Oops. xD
I don't think it was the same compound, or you screwed up Horribly, because the alternative Nitro (not Nitrito) compound is Redish-organge, and the sub-alternate (starting material, chloropentaammine cobalt (III) chloride) is purple/blueish. You were probably making Boron salts or alkali-halogen salts, which are for the most part White.
Either that or the Sodium Nitrite didn't dissolve