Homemade Crayons!

Here is a fun easy project I've been doing for a couple of years with Nathan's and my student's broken crayons!  I used to just throw away broken crayons.  Now I save them, Hoarders style, in a big yellow bucket.

When I am ready to make crayons, I have to peel the labels off.  This takes awhile so I plop myself on the couch with a good movie or a date with the DVR, and get to work.

I then sort the crayons into like colors.  I only do the rainbow colors.  So all the shades of blue go into  the blue pile.  I then get out my crayon supplies: a small metal pot and small metal bowl, both from Goodwill.  I also have a hot pad that I use just for crayons, a skewer to stir the melted wax, an old towel to set out on the counter to catch any drips, paper towels to wipe out the metal bowl, and plastic molds to pour the wax into.  Some of the plastic molds I have are soap molds, some are chocolate molds, and some are lollipop molds.  I've gotten them at Michaels, Joanns, and Amazon.

I set the pot and metal bowl up as a double boiler, with water in the pot and the sorted crayons in the bowl. 

I wait until they are all melted, then using the hot pad, I pour the wax into the plastic molds. 

I allow them to completely cool.  Sometimes if I want them to cool faster, I put the mold in the refrigerator. 

Here is the process again, but with green.  Put the crayons in the bowl.

Using the skewer, stir until completely melted.

When finished pouring the wax into the molds, wipe out the bowl with a paper towel to get rid of all of the green residue and to get ready for a new color. 

 

That's it!  I made Super Hero crayons as part of the goodie bags for Nathan's birthday a couple of weeks ago.  I plan to make crayons for the kids' table at my brother-in-law's wedding in May, and I always send my students home for the summer with some homemade crayons.  This year they will be getting little paw prints, since we are the Mill Park Panthers.  It'll be so cute!