Recycled crayons

I've been meaning to try this for ages!

This is a great way of getting rid of all of those wee bitsy ends of wax crayons and is lots of fun too.

I tried to get Sophie to give the instructions for this activity too, but she was far more interested in going for a walk to the river with Daddy than educating you all. She did, however, take a few of the photos, while I cringed and prayed for the safety of our precious fancypants camera.

1) Sort crayons into 'like' colours - or random collections of colours if you prefer - and place in silicone muffin moulds. Ours here just happened to be in the otherwise useless shape of bear heads.



2) Bung 'em in the oven for 15 minutes or so. What temperature was the oven, you ask? Dunno. Hot. Maybe 180 celcius??

3) When melted, remove and allow to cool.

4) Remove from moulds - Ta-da!



And the bear heads - after being used for quite some time, hence the flat faces.


Some of these ended up with a layer of clearish wax near the top. This was worse where we used cheap and nasty crayons, rather than the ancient school editions that I purged from dark corners of my classroom earlier today. In any case, it picks off, but actually draws okay in most cases anyway, giving a lighter shade of the 'main' part.

And the proof that they work - a drawing of flowers. Because she draws very little else these days!



I'll add this picture of some of the wildflowers that Sophie picked from her garden that we planted back in October. She really enjoys picking them and arranging them in wee vases on her windowsill. I'm not sure what type they are, but they come from a packet called 'Beneficial Insect Blend' or something similar.