Saturday, May 9, 2009

Toddler crayons...

What does one do with a whole bag of old, unwanted, crayons... some that are perfectly good - just extremely illogical for small hands... and others that are broken and of no use to anyone??


Why, recycle them into toddler crayons, of course!!!

Like most families with toddlers... no matter what the child's temperament. you always end up with a bunch broken crayons.... Fact of life. Those thin, elongated little buggers, are just not designed for a toddlers chunky hands, or their beautiful, spontaneous spurts of swirling energy & creativity! So what's the solution? These beauties...


Here's how it works....
You’ll need:
  • Crayons - (you can purchase them cheaply at the back to school sales.... or just use ones you already have! - I would highly recommend using higher quality [Crayola] crayons though!!)
  • Muffin pan or candy molds (preferably one that you don’t mind getting a little crayon on! Also, some prefer mini muffin tins... I used a regular sized one.)
  • An oven
Preheat your oven to 250 degrees F.

Peel off all the paper from the crayons...

(for the new ones, I found it much quicker to remove the paper in one smooth motion if I carefully ran the exacto knife down the center of the paper and peeled the paper back -- for the old ones with stubborn wrappers, a minute or two soak under running hot water worked well.)
Break them into small pieces... & arrange them in each cup of the tin.
(I did like colors together, but multi-colored ones would be fun, as well!)

Bake just long enough to be melted, so you can’t distinguish the crayon shape anymore
(^These^ are not quite there yet!)
Turn off the stove...
but leave them to sit & congeal a little, before moving the pan.

(**this is especially important if you are doing multi-colored crayons!! -- Failure to do so, will cause the colors to amalgamate... and you will end up with brown crayons!!!**)
Let them cool and solidify....
Pop them out of the tins....

(If you have trouble with this, you can put them in the freezer for a bit)
And Enjoy!


Apparently they make good stacking toys too! ;)








Did you have trouble with a clear layer of wax forming on the top of your crayons?
See my Addendum post, here.

20 comments:

Megan said...

That's so cool. Gonna have to try that.

Erin said...

The crayons are gorgeous!!

Debbie said...

Oh these are too cool! I'll have to try this! Thanks for the blog!

Anonymous said...

I saw this and told a friend. She used a star shaped cupcake pan and made crayon stars, they turned out beautifully. great idea!

Keira Gillett said...

Wow! That's hot I want some for me!

Mer (Lulu's Mommy) said...

I have seen these for sale! We are not drowned in crayons yet

Tiph said...

@ Mer (Lulu's Mommy) - Since my dd is only 21mos, I didn't have a huge collection built up either (I think I had one 24-count box in my possession. Lol). What I did, is kept my eyes open at garage sales, as well as asked around among friends who had older children... that way, you're bound to find them cheaply if not for free! :)

Anonymous said...

Such a lovely little one. Thanks for sharing how to make toddler crayons. When mine were little we bought the block crayons from the Waldorf store but these are great for little hands as well.

Amanda Conley said...

I just stumbled upon your blog and I love this post. We suffer from a mess of crayons too. I'm excited to try this!

rachel said...

this is such a wonderful idea. very practical, fun, and beautiful.

Michelle M said...

I love this idea! I have no kids myself, but know that lots would enjoy these big bulky stackable crayons!! I cant wait to make some

Anonymous said...

you should patent these and sell them! make them organic and you'll have something nobody else out there is selling.
just my 2 cents.

:)

Sam said...

Well done on a brilliant idea. My kids are a little out of this age range now unfortunately so I have no need to do this now - bottom lip sticking out. Might just have to do it for the fun aspect instead.
Take care
Sam x

Tiph said...

To our concerned reader, Ingo:

I want you to know how much I appreciate your thorough glance over my post. Apparently your expertise & knowledge of parenthood is vast... and that's why you felt at such liberty as to so rudely criticize and discredit the job I am doing as my DAUGHTER's mommy.- Not to mention, so publicly on my blog.

Now, if you actually stopped & read what I wrote, you'd see that my concern with regular crayons was never that SHE would choke. Look again my foul, negative, friend... and you'll see my statement was, they are "Illogical for small hands"... ie, the are hard for toddlers to grasp and break too easily.

But again, thank you so much for your concern.

~Admin

(BTW, in case you didn't catch it... the baby pictured in the post, is a happy, thriving, well loved & cared for GIRL!)

CATHY said...

I love this idea!

promobob said...

It's nekkid coloring time!! Thanks for the crafty and useful idea!

Tiph said...

@promobob -
LoL! Our pastor says Naked, "Nekkid"... and I giggle every time. ;-)
Just so you know, I am pretty sure she had a diaper/panties on in these pix... you just can't tell because you can only see from waist up. :-)

pingu said...

great!

Kristy said...

This is such a great idea! I just happened across your blog and I have a 19 month old DD and she has a little 17 month old friend with her every day, so we are definitely going to try this! Thanks for the idea!

Traci said...

OH, we have done this so many times and now that my girls are 8 & 5 they still enjoy the process of peeling & cooking them. They'd make great birthday or christmas presents for a younger cousin :)