What to Do with Broken Crayons - Recycle them!
Dec 11 '06
The Bottom Line You know you have a stash hidden away!
If you have little kids you have them, broken crayons. You know the kids aren't going to color with them anymore, yet you just can't part with them. You may even have more broken dull crayons in your house than nice sharp useable ones. Here are some fun things to do with all those broken crayons, using (mostly) things you probably have around the house.
Note, that most of these projects require heat and adult supervision. Also, washable crayons do not work you need to use regular ones.
Stained Glass Windows
Use a grater or handheld pencil sharpener to turn crayons into small bits. If you have a pencil sharpen where shavings fall into an enclosed case even a 3 year old can safely do this with supervision. Now take the shavings or gratings and scatter them on a piece of wax paper. Top it with another piece of wax paper and iron the artwork. An old towel over the waxed paper will keep the crayon from sticking to the iron. Children can use construction paper to make a frame and glue the "stained glass" to the frame to make a sun catcher.
Make New Crayons
You don't need a fancy (or expensive) crayon machine to recycle your old ones. Any microwave safe container you are willing to dedicate to the cause will work; we use disposable food storage containers. Just toss in some broken crayon remains and heat on medium in the microwave until they melt. Then pour into molds.
Of course you have molds! I have some old candy making molds that we use for this activity, but just about any piece of plastic will do. We have even used caps from soda and water bottles to make disk crayons. As the wax cools it pulls away from the sides, but a quick spritz of cooking spray helps if you aren't sure. You can form any shape with aluminum foil, the non-stick kind works best. Pour the melted wax onto a small tray and cut shapes out with small cookie cutters. Let you kids use their imaginations. You can layer different colors by allowing them to cool between layers.
Close supervision is necessary as the melted wax is hot. Watching it carefully and only using medium heat helps keep the temperatures to a minimum. If you don't have a microwave you can toss bits of broken crayons into mini muffin tins and heat at about 250° until melted, then let them harden and cool before removing. And if your kids are reasonable patient and use small pits of crayons even the sun on a hot day will safely melt crayons. A black plastic garbage bag place over the crayons will hasten melting.
Candles Anyone?
If you save all those old crayon bits you probably save candle stubs too. This project makes use of all of all of them, plus all the glass jars you've been saving for some unknown reason. Even those baby food jars you've been saving from your 5 year old "baby" will do. For this project you will have to buy some candle wicks, available at most mass merchandising or craft stores; 10 yards costs less than $4.
Wind the wick around a pencil and hang in the clean glass jar. This works better if you have something, like a button or old wick weight to keep the wick centered. Even an old washer will do. Now melt down your old candles in the microwave on medium heat until melted. Be careful about the scents you choose to mix and white or light colored candles work best for this project.
Pour a little melted wax into the prepared jar with wick and have your children add a small bit of broken crayon. The heat from the wax melts the crayon and creates interesting swirl designs. Continue to alternate wax and crayons until the jar is filled. Once the wax sets unwind the wick from the pencil and trim. Children can have fun decorating the glass jar as well. These do make nice homemade gifts!
Alternately you can buy inexpensive candles, even birthday ones will do and dip them into a can of melted crayons to color them anyway you want. Just be careful with little fingers getting near the hot melted wax.
Wearable Art
Any old clean t-shirt can be used for this project. Old adult sized ones make good painting smocks or nightgowns but just about any piece of cotton will do.
Place the shirt on your ironing board, with an old towel or piece of cardboard underneath. Let children sprinkle shavings or crayon gratings onto the t-shirt into any pattern or design they like. Cover the artwork with wax paper and then another old towel and iron away. Use low to medium heat but take your time so the pigment can transfer into the cloth.
The wax will wash away, but your children can use a plastic spoon to scrape some up. You may want to hand wash the article a few times but don't put it in the drier unless you are 100% certain all of the wax is gone.
Refrigerator Magnets
In addition to crayons you will need some magnets. A strip several feet long is less than $2 at a discount store or you can purchase some stronger button style magnets inexpensively as well. This is a great project on a hot summer day so the little ones can participate with the melting.
Drop shaved or grated crayon bits into any mold; the indented bottom of a soda can works well and makes a nice sized magnet. Small shavings will melt fairly quickly in the heat of summer. Once the colors have melted a toothpick can be used to swirl the colors or just let it happen naturally. Bring the cans inside to cool and pop the disks out. Glue the magnets to the flat side and you have nice homemade magnets. If you buy the strip magnets with the sticky tape side you will still want to glue them down.
These are nice when you use themed colors, pastels for spring; red, orange, yellow and green for fall (don’t mix too much or you end up with brown); lots of orange and black for Halloween; blue, yellow and white for Chanukah. These are also a good use for those pesky white crayons that never seem to get used!
Mosaics
Who says you have to color with those broken crayons. Let the kids glue them to a sturdy piece of cardboard to make a mosaic. Offer up some pasta, buttons and beans too. Sure to keep kids busy for an hour!
You Can throw them Away
If you aren't going to do anything else with them, throw them out. They are just taking up space and your kids aren't going to pick up an old broken crayon in favor of a new one. If you are planning a tag sale in the near future toss all those broken pieces into a Ziploc bag, price it at a quarter, print out this project list and let them be someone else's problem!
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