Recycled Crayons

I am constantly adding to my list of fun projects and such that I want to make. One of them was these. Recycled crayons. I had seen a few tutorials on doing this and took bits and pieces from each one. It took a lot longer than I expected it to but I loved how they turned out. Here is a run down of what we did.


We took all the labels off of already broken crayons and separated them by color. It didn't seem like we had a lot of crayons to work with but it ended up making a lot.

I had gotten these ice cube trays from IKEA when I went to California in February. I don't know why I grabbed them. They were right there by the checkout and I just saw them and grabbed them. I suppose that's why they put things there, for suckers like me. I tried making jello in them once. Big mess. Won't do it again. As ice cube trays they're a little "eh, whatever." But as molds for crayon making they were perfect! I'm now searching out other fun uses.

One tutorial I read talked about microwaving them, to melt them. I tried this first in the cups. Only to learn that the cups will melt with so much microwaving (oops). Then I put them in my glass measuring cups. They take a long time in the microwave and if you have a microwave like I do (somewhat temperamental, like most things and people around here) then it just might overheat. Like mine did. After the overheating incident, it just shut itself off. I unplugged it crossed my fingers. Thankfully once it cooled off it is back in business. But not in the business of melting crayons.

Which is why I turned to the double broiler method. Which is why this ended up taking so long. Going this way takes much longer for the crayons to melt. I had two going at the same time. I used a kebab skewer as my stir-er-er. It worked better than a spoon, I think. It was skinny and long and less washing! Can't go wrong there.

Once I started pouring in the molds it got fun. I had decided I was going to layer the colors. Miss Thing helped during this part telling me where to pour what. She gets really bossy sometimes.

After I had everything melted and everything poured in the cute little molds I stuck them in the freezer to speed up the process of setting up. I forgot to take pictures of this and when we popped them out. They came right out and the molds cleaned up beautifully! I love how they turned out.

She likes to arrange and rearrange things. So that's what she set out to do right away. She was so excited to show The Boy when he came home from school that day the fun project we did.

I can't decide if I like them just solid.

Or stripped. I'm not sure why I didn't add more layers. I think I might of liked it better if I had done thinner layers and more off them. Now I know for next time!

Either way it was fun, fun!

Here are a couple of the tutorials I used:

Make & Takes

Not So Idle Hands