Mommy Made Crayons

  A long time ago I saw some homemade crayons at Papervine and I wanted to try and make some for Little One. I have since seen a few similar posts on Pinterest and have been so impressed at how the crayons turned out. Mine, however, didn't come out quite as nicely, but I still had great fun making them and would definitely do it again.

It's pretty cold over here right now, and just in case you're wondering, we didn't have a mini heat wave in June :). This activity was done late December, when it's very hot here in Cape Town. Apparently if you don't have the sun, you can make these using the oven, but I personally think that sun "baked" crayons are much more fun :).

 If you look closely, you can spot some aeroplanes, boats, cars and trains.

The Steps:

• Go and find all those old crayons lying around and peel off the paper. (Some children love this and it's a great workout for little fingers). Put your crayons into containers. Tip: Wipe your crayons, so that they are nice and clean.

• Chop up the crayons into small pieces. Tip: For a nicer end result, clean your chopping board after you cut each colour, to keep your colours clean.

• Put the small pieces into molds of your choice and squash as many crayons as you can into each individual mold. Now put your crayons into the hottest spot you can find. Tip: I recommend using a silicone mold. The star mold I used was an inexpensive soft ice tray and the crayons completely flopped.

• Keep checking, because as the crayons melt you will have to top up with more small pieces to keep the mold full.

• When the crayons have melted, carefully move the mold to a cooler spot. The crayons will cool down and harden. Tip: Do be careful when picking up the mold - silicone is soft and unstable and the liquid wax crayon is very hot.

• When completely hard, pop the "new" crayons out.

• I mixed better quality crayons with cheaper crayons and I noticed that the crayons separated, leaving a clear wax layer at the bottom of each crayon. I simply shaved the waxy part off with a sharp knife. Tip: I could be wrong, but the softer, smaller crayons seemed to be of a better quality than the bigger, harder variety.

• All done - It's time to colour - Have fun!