If you have kids that love to color, then you have tiny bits of crayons that most people just throw away.  I know my kids get new boxes at the beginning of the school year, for birthdays, Easter, Christmas, and at other random times throughout the year. Instead of tossing the crayons that "spontaneously broke by themselves while my child was holding it," I collect these little bits because my kids have a tendency not to want to use them because they are broken. I know my kids are not the only ones that have broken crayons so I contacted my local elementary school. What better place to find broken crayons, right? Turns out that the school was just going to throw these old, broken crayons away so I asked for them and they bagged them up and gave them to me. Now I have a stash of broken crayons that I can use to make more crayons.

The hardest part of this whole project is unwrapping the crayons. For that, I turned to my little helpers. I took a knife and scored the sides of the paper and let the kids sit and peel for a while. We also broke them into pieces that fit into the cups of my tin.  I had this nightmare thought that if the crayon pieces were larger, they might somehow escape to the floor of my oven. That sounds like a mess I would never be able to clean entirely.

We organized them by the colors we wanted them to melt with and put them in an old muffin tin.  I only use this tin for crayons.  If you actually bake with yours then you will want to line them with foil cups.  Ive never done it that way but It seems like paper wouldn't work since the crayons would stick.


When all the unwrapping fun is done and the cups are filled then it's time to pop them in the oven and turn it on.  200 degrees on the center rack. 

Melt them until they are flat on the top and completely blended. Resist the urge to touch the melted, gooey mess. I know, it just calls out to you but if you want pretty crayons, you'll thank me. I tried to poke one of the pieces down when it was almost done to make mine pretty and a few bumps were left on the top.  For my efforts I was rewarded with a dent in my crayon and some brightly colored wax on my finger. All in all it took me about 30 minutes but my kids peeked a few times.  Just start checking after 15 minutes so you don't burn them. 


Now it's time to let them cool and solidify. It's a cold day here so I stuck ours outside to cool.  When they are cool enough just pop them out like an ice cube tray and voila! You have some custom crayons that will be harder for your most ardent destroyer to break.



Just for kicks I put all the brown crayons into my chocolate bar silicone pan.  It almost looks edible.  I might try to feed it to my Hubby later. 

XOXO Mist