Friday, August 29, 2008

crafting with crayons

I started this summer with visions of all sorts of crafty things the kids and I would do together. Then it got kind of hot. And I remembered that I don't like to be outside that much - especially when it's hot. This is my attempt to get one fun crafty thing in before school starts on Tuesday. (If they're lucky, I might whip out some paint on Labor Day.)
We've been saving all the little nubs of crayons that gather at the bottom of the bin, but no one ever uses. Between our house and the neighbor's we had quite a few. You'll have to take off all the paper wrappers that might be left and then chop them into little pieces - the size of peas. This should be done outside if possible, because there will be teeny tiny bits of crayon all over the place. May I recommend using something other than a cutting board from your kitchen. However, if you foolishly grab that one, I found that baking soda and a scrubby will clean it up rather well, though you may still have some technicolor residue left for your carrot sticks at snack time.
After all the crayons have been chopped up, you can throw them in a pile or get all anal and make the kids separate them by color. (I swear it was easier for them to make their color choices when they were organized!) This is also a good time to preheat your oven to 150degrees.
Using a thrifted mini-muffin pan(I did think ahead about this part of the project), let the kids fill each cup with colors of their choice. Then get all anal again and make a little diagram so you know which one belongs to which kid.

Stick them in the oven for 25 minutes or more - til they melt together. Do not get all antsy when you look at them 20 minutes into it and see that they still look like individual nubs and crank up the heat to 175 and go watch the news forgetting about them. If you do this, you will get mini crayon soups. All will not be lost though because most will still turn out pretty cool and you will know that next time, they just need to be in there a lot longer or that the heat should be turned up just slightly.

Color and enjoy!
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1 comment:

Rebekah said...

fun! I loved making crayons like these when I was a kid. Our crayon collection would always make my dad go into a rant: "when I was your age, I only had one box of 8 crayons and I used it all through elementary school..." I can't even fathom living without a box of 64 crayons :)