Recycled Valentines

Ellen and I made some recycled valentines this week. I've made them before, when I was a teacher, and I came across the idea again while surfing the blog-word.

We made rainbow crayons! It's an easy thing to do with little ones and they get so excited to see the end result.
Here's how you do it.

Step 1: Find all the broken/old crayons and peel the paper off. (Good for those little fingers)



Step 2: Break the crayons into pea-sized pieces. I used an old knife.



Step 3: Put the crayon pieces into an OLD muffin tin. I have read that if you spray them with non-stick cooking spray it helps. I forgot this step, so they didn't pop right out, but I found another way. (see step 4) Make sure the tins a full with crayons and bake in the oven at 275 degrees for 7-8 minutes.

Step 4: After the crayons melt, let them cool. This is where I fixed my non-stick problem. I put the tin into the freezer. They cooled a lot quicker and the wax pulled away from the sides of the tin. Just like if you put a glass candle holder full of hardened wax in the freezer it will "shrink" and pop right out of the holder.

Step 5: Now you have beautiful rainbow crayons. As you can see, we used a heart shaped tin. Ellen is giving them to her friends with her Valentine's Day cards.

This was super easy and lots of fun.