I recycle my grandchildren's broken crayons into new crayons. Take all pieces of the same color crayon and melt in a can set in water on the stove. Be careful, this is very hot. Pour into a mold and cool. I use a candy mold. This makes crayons in new fun shapes. You can also mix colors to get some new colors. Also, if you make heart shaped red ones, you can pair them with a hand made Valentine, saying "you color my world, be mine". Perfect for preschool parties.
We just recently went through our crayon bin and took all of the broken crayons out. My 2 year old daughter always is coloring, like 4-5 hours a day literally, and I was tryin to think of what to do with them. I wondered out loud, and she brought over our silicone mini muffin pan. I have to tell you, it worked out wonderful! I did the oven at 350 and put some crayons in each muffin cup slot, baked/melted for I think 10 minutes (or just keep peeking until they're all melted) and took the pan out and set on the counter on a wire cooling rack. Once they were solid and cooled I could easily pop them out and they were ready to go.
When our girls were little I made all sorts of crayons like this for them and their friends. It is fun looking for the candy molds at garage sales, thrift stores and such. For birthday gifts for the girls' friends, I would find out their friends favorite cartoon/hero/character and then go buy a candy mold (check Hobby Lobby and Michael's, and use those store coupons) with that character. I would also buy a coloring book with that same theme. If I couldn't find the coloring book with that theme, I would buy a regular reading book with that character, and also buy a scribble tablet to include with the customized crayons. These cool molded crayons also make nice fundraiser items...make them (inexpensively) and sell them for that special organization or project (good money can be made this way!) My girls are 25 and 21 now, and I know they would love it if I would make them some of these crayons from their childhood...we are NEVER too old for crayons! Another fun thing to do with the candy molds is to pour them full of plaster and let dry. Once completely dried, paint them, and add a magnet on the back. Fun refrigerator magnets. (Recycling tip...if you can get your hands on an old refrigerator, the door seal is magnet (or at least they used to be), and there is a lot of magnet in the fridge door. If your cupboards are bare of crayons, place a wanted post on your local Freecycle group. www.freecycle.org
I do this in the microwave using several small bathroom paper cups at a time. I put these on a firm dinner plate and nuke until enough crayon is melted to hold the mixed colors together. Pop the whole plate into the fridge and they harden fast, then peel off paper cup.
a previous post on thriftyfun.... Heat oven to 250 degrees F. Fill each mold with assorted colors of crayon pieces (paper removed) and bake until the crayons melt, about 10 to 15 minutes. (Tip: Place a sheet pan under the crayons to catch any drips). Once they're cool, remove the hearts from the mold and smooth any rough edges by rubbing them on a piece of scrap paper or a steak knife. Use small pieces of foam tape to stick each heart to a 3-inch circle cut from card stock and add a message. Suggested messages:
You color my world Valentine, you make my heart melt Have a happy Valentine's Day, for "crayon" out loud! We made these with our children, so easy to make. It gets rid of all those broken old crayons. You can actually use any shape metal cookie or muffin tin our tins were heart shaped and about 1 1/2 inches across.but you can use any size you'd like, bigger or smaller. You can make solid colors or multi colored shapes. We not only made the valentine cards for school but also just used them as unusual shaped crayons.
Great idea! Here's another: We made "stained glass" out of old crayons. Just grate them onto wax paper and have an adult iron another piece of wax paper on top. Punch a hole and hang in a window as a suncatcher. They seem to hold up better if you staple or glue a construction paper or cardstock frame around the edge.
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