I found a few manky crayons in a gutter the other day, on the way to the park. I picked them up (by no means the nastiest thing I have fished out of a gutter) to try that Melty Thing. It is a genius idea; crayons get so quickly get broken/ pick up a layer of muck that every family house probably has a stash in disfavour. Just give them a new lease of life with a bit of melting into shapes action.
I have a few cool shaped ice trays, I always pick them up in charity shops and car boots and I use them for resin craft, (Well, I did try, um, baking in the elephant shape one and melted half of it. Really, they look just like the silicon muffin numbers.)
In an act of Completely Obvious Craft Blogging here is how I did it – not the baking melt fiasco, the crayon shapes, yeah?
- I oiled the shapes first, to help them pop out easier.
- They take about 40 sec to melt, I kept them moving all the time.
- I worked from light/ similar colours to dark so that I didn’t have to clean the pan much inbetween.
- They take about 30 minutes to dry solid in a cold place (my kitchen table)
- The ones that I filled less than 1 centimetre broke as I popped them out – so don’t be stingy with the liquid!
- You will need White Spirit to clean out your ice trays and pans, so do use ones you don’t use for consumption anymore!
This is going to make a fine gift for a little tot I know- toddlers are actually quite hard to make for, beyond sewing cuddly things. I am hoarding jars for my Christmas gifts- it must be THE thriftiest way of giving nice gifts. Start doing it and in a couple of weeks they’ll be a thrifty, gifty ideas for jars post… *raises eyebrows up and down in a conspirational- watch-this-space- kind of a way*
These look really cute, I’ve seen it done where you just bung all the colours in together and somehow it goes marbled looking, rather than the muddy brown mess you’d expect!
Yes! I marbled some by accident (somehow thought I’d create layers but of course they, er, need to dry in between.) I even saw them being used just as card decorations – possibilities are endless! X
Have you tried melting multiple colours in the same shape? If so, how did it turn out? I’d hope for a cool multi colour crayon rather some manky shade!
Yep, they go marbley, not manky! I kept most solid color in case it could help her learn colours, how boring!
I have seen something smilar and they are really cool. I have a daugther would eat them though, thinking they were sweets!!!
Hahaa Ramona has eaten her fair share in the past!
That is a genius idea! What a brilliant way of using up old crayons and they look better like that anyway!
Yeah, and that’s with all my slapdashery!
They look fab! X
thanks! x x
They look fabulous 🙂 bit worried it would kill my saucepans but tempted anyway 😉
I have one sacrificial pan for craft, candles etc 🙂
oh my goodness – this is such a brilliant idea! I think a christmas present for my niece has just been solved 🙂
I absolutely love this idea and was feeling all smug after using up our old crayon bits (some of my own broken crayons from the 80s included) by making alphabet crayons. But your idea is way better. Love the idea of making them into a present.
No way! Alphabet crayons are genius!
[…] Fill with reshaped old crayons Melting and reshaping old crayons makes a gorgeous gift for children. Putting them in a handy jar so you can see the shapes and colours against the side make it that bit more special. […]
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If you don’t want to sacrifice a saucepan, you can fill your saucepan with water, and put your crayons/wax/other crafting item that needs melting in a tin. For candle making I keep a tin for each colour, for crayons you’d probably want to follow the bloggers advice and start with light colours, but you could just chuck/recycle the tin at the end, and not have to spend ages cleaning…