Rainbow Crayons

 

We love to recycle our broken crayons. It seems a waste to throw them away, but who needs broken crayons!? For our valentines this year we made heart shaped crayons with our old, broken crayons. It's very easy and fun to do and you don't need much to do it! There are a lot of ways to do this, but with all the "recipes" all you need is some old broken crayons and a silicone mold (and an oven.).

What You Need:

• old broken crayons (if you have little kids, you have these.)
• silicone mold with fun shapes. (You might want to forever designate these to crafting afterward and you can buy cheapy molds at Ikea or Target. I got mine at Target a few years ago in the dollar area.)
• Knife and cutting board for very thick crayons.

What You do:

1. Peel all the paper off the old, broken crayons.

2. Break them up some more. You may need to cut extra thick crayons with a knife, they're tough to break, but the thin ones are a snap. (literally!) At this point my kids had a great time sorting them into piles of different colors.

3. Have your Octopi fill the molds with bits of crayons. You can do different shades of the same color, do different colors for a swirly rainbow effect, or do themed crayons like "fall" with reds and yellows and oranges and "night" with dark blues and purples and bits of silver for stars.

4. Put the filled molds into a preheated 200* oven just until the crayons melt. Keep an eye on your crayons. They'll take about 15-20 minutes to melt. The kids had a fun time coming to see them melt at different stages.

 5. When melted take the molds out to cool on the counter or put in the freezer to speed the process. Be very careful when taking the molds out of the oven, melted wax is very flimsy and super hot!

6. When cool and hard, pop the crayons out of the molds.

7. Color! Or double stick tape to cards made from card stock with phrases like "You color my world" and "You melt my heart" and gift to other Octopi for Valentine's Day.

*Tip: To clean your silicone molds, spill a little oil in the tray and swish it around. Let is stand for a little bit then scrub our your trays with soap and water. It really cleans up pretty well.

Leaf Rubbings

The other day my kindergartener wanted to collect leaves and send them to relatives. Since I am pretty sure everyone in our family has plenty of their own leaves falling in copious amounts on their lawns at the moment, I suggested we do something more artistic with the leaves we found. We settled on the easy to do and totally satisfying leaf rubbing. It takes no time at all and not much in the way of materials and they're ones I'm sure you have.

What You Need:
broken, unwrapped lengths of crayon (we love a craft that uses these- I hate to toss them, but who needs broken crayons!?)
white paper
flat fall leaves (We made ourselves a little adventure just collecting these.)
masking tape, optional.

What You do:

1. On one piece of white paper lay out your leaves in whatever pattern you chose.
2. Lay the paper you're going to color on flat on top of your leaves Secure it in the corners with tape. This helps to keep it from moving when your octopus is rubbing.
3. Take a broken bit of crayon and rub it along the paper, over the leaves, on its side (not the ends!)
4. Watch your leaves come out!

My kid really loved doing this a lot more than I expected. It was kind of like digging for treasure (or fossils!). He never knew which leaf was going to pop up and the more colors he used the better it came out.

A neat thing to do with an older kid would be to collect one of several varieties and label the rubbings with the tree species.

Pressed Leaf Collage

It's fun to go out hunting for colorful leaves but what to do with them? Spiff had collected so many leaves last year that I was on a mission to do something crafty rather than just toss them.

This is a great, easy fall craft I found online last year. And it's a good way to use old broken crayons bits, to boot. Spiff made several for friends and family to ring in the fall season. He wanted to make so many, we had to go out and collect MORE leaves. This year when I pulled it out to hang, last year's craft looks as nice as when it was first made. (Actually that picture is of the one we kept last year taken today.)


What You Need:

• wax paper
• colorful fall leaves (you might want to press them in between heavy books for a couple of days before doing this.)
• old crayon bits in bright fall colors- greens, reds, yellows., etc.
• crayon sharpener
• scissors
• iron

What You Do:

• Heat your iron to medium dry heat.
• Shave your crayon bits in your sharpener until you have a nice pile for sprinkling over your artwork. Set aside.
• Tear off two pieces of wax paper big enough for your leaves to fit comfortably. Lay one down flat on your protected work surface. (Cut-open brown paper bags are a good way to cover your table.)
• Let your Octopus arrange the fall leaves on the wax paper.
• Octopus, sprinkle the crayon bits around your leaves on the wax paper.
• Gently lay the other piece of wax paper on top.
• Lay another piece of brown paper or paper towels on top to protect your iron (the crayon wax will squish out the sides a little) and then press and slowly iron your artwork.
• Let cool. When it's cool, trim the edges and hang in a window.