Make Your Own Recycled Chunky Crayons!!

Remember the excitement you felt as a child when you received a brand new box of pointy, sharpened, brightly-colored crayons? Oh my older brother used to get so mad at me when he was forced to share his crayons and markers with me – “You are coloring *TOO* hard!!! Stop coloring *SO* hard!! You are going to break my crayons!!! YOU ARE RUINING MY NEW CRAYONS!!!”

*evil chuckle* from the little sister team.

So to avoid this super fun kind of scenerio as a parent now yourself,…I think you might find this craft extra awesome over Christmas Break! You know all those little annoying bits and pieces of broken crayons in your kids art box? What on Earth will you ever do with them besides toss them out right? WRONG-O!! Your kids will LOVE recycling those pesky old crayons and creating their own brand new, super colorful, chunk crayons! Great thing is that it also helps organize the art supplies!

This was fun to do with our kiddos and I learned a few helpful hints to pass along to you! The recipe that I went by suggested using a mini muffin pan lined with tin foil. Didn’t work so well. The crayons work, they just aren’t nearly as pretty as the ones we made using the full size muffin pan. Here’s a peek. (notice we had to “label” which side was each of our kids because ohmygosh dont mix them up mom)!!

So yeah, they are sorta kinda circular and they draw if that indicates my success! The problem was with the foil. I don’t recommend it! I think some people are concerned about the wax getting on their pans for life, but I did not have this issue with the large greased muffin pan at all! Hot wax landed on my toes and the Bamboo – I KNOW, on the Bamboo!

So for the large muffin tins…Preheat the oven to 300 degrees F or lower.

1. Start by sorting out all those old broken crayons. Once you have them sorted, place them in a bowl of cold water for aprox. 20 minutes (this makes the paper peel off easier).

2. Once peeled, place the wet crayons on a towel to dry.

3. Grease your muffin tin with vegetable oil and pour the broken crayons into each spot. The more you use, the bigger the chunky crayon. This is so much fun! Your child gets to choose whatever colors they love and mix and match them to create their own unique crayon colors! Of course, our M chose pretty shades of pinks and purples to mix together and our E chose every shade of blue, green and reds!

4. Place the muffin tin full of crayons into a preheated oven of 275 degrees F. Bake for aprox. 7-8 minutes or just until they are melted enough to blend the colors and hold them together. If you cook them until they are a liquid, they could meld into one dark color.When they look melted enough, carefully remove them from the oven. You can stir them with a toothpick for a swirly look, or leave them just as they are. Let them cool completely. We put our muffin tin in the freezer to speed things up! Once cooled – pop them out and have some fun!

…and here they are!

This one is my personal fav – it’s an Earth Crayon!!!

I hope you enjoy this project with your kids as much as we did! Next time, I want to add more crayons and fill the muffin tins up for the super-duperdest chunky monkiest crayons EVER!