On May - 19 - 2009
I don’t know about your house but at our house with three kids we have more itty bitty, well used, broken crayon pieces than we know what to do with. It felt like such a waste to throw them away so for months now I’ve been collected them in a Ziploc bag. And… although I like the thought of Crazy Crayons National Crayon Recycling program I thought to myself why mail them away for someone else to make money off of when we could reuse them? That thought started me on an internet search for basic, no frills crayon melting instructions. There are 100s of slightly different ways to do this so I decided I would pick and choose and tada our first batch of recycled crayons was born.
What I used:
-Bag of old, broken, well loved now neglected, crayons
-Muffin pan
-Cooking spray
-Foil (optional)
-Paring knife (optional)
-Paring knife (optional)
What I did:
-PREHEATED the oven to 175 degrees
-SPRAYED the muffin pan with cooking spray, or you could use foil to line the pan and then spray
-PEELED the wrappers off the crayons
The most tedious part was peeling the wrappers off, but you could enlist your kid’s help [re]making crayons and turn it into a rainy day project and use it as an opportunity to teach them about reusing, reducing, recycling. If you want to do this one on your own don’t waste time peeling those hard to peel wrappers. I took a paring knife and ever so carefully but with enough force to cut through the wrapper cut a slit in the wrapper and was able to peel it off all at once. Just some of the crayons I did:
-BROKE the crayons into small pieces
Remember that the smaller the pieces are the faster they’ll melt. One recipe said no larger than 1″ pieces, but I just broke them up figuring as long as they were all about the same size they’d all melt at relatively the same time. If you want to stick to certain colors I recommend sorting the crayons into the muffin tin as you go because while some colors are obvious (yellows, pinks, etc) once you get the wrappers off of the darker ones you’ll have a hard time telling purples from blues, etc.
-FILLED muffin tin with crayon pieces
One recipe said about an inch thick but I filled the cups about 3/4 of the way full. I started out trying to stick to similar shades, but threw a couple of “mixed” cups in there too just to see how they would turn out.
Browns, Purples, Yellows, Oranges, Mix, Mix, Greens, Pinks, Mix, Darks, Blues, Reds:
-BAKED them in the oven until all the wax was melted
I started the oven out at 175 degrees but after 20 minutes and virtually no melting I bumped it to 225 degrees.
12 minutes later: 
50 minutes from start time:
At the hour mark I bumped the over up to 275 to get the last few pieces entirely melted and about 10 minutes later I pulled them out:
-COOLED the muffin pan on a wire rack, safely away from curious little toddlers. One site said you could cool them in the freezer for faster cooling but I just left them on the counter
-REMOVED the chunky crayons by putting the paring knife down the side and popping them out.
Make sure the crayons are completely cool before you try to remove them, I waited an hour.
I flipped them over so you could see the swirls.
-TESTED
I ended up using about 3/4 of the bag of crayons I started out with, which means all those crayons aren’t going to wind up in a landfill. One site I checked out mentioned using soap molds to make the new crayons into different shapes… I’m going to check those out next time we go to a craft store. How cool would it be to give a kid that loves to color his or her very own homemade, personalized crayons using letter molds to make their name, number molds to make their age, their favorite shapes, etc…the possibilities are endless! The best part is if you’re not happy melt ‘em down again and start over!
May 19th, 2009 at 2:07 pm
This is GREAT! We have a cardboard 3 drawer thing (the kind you get at walmart for $4 and fold together yourself) It has old papers that can be colored on, notebooks, and coloring books in it and the top drawer is any & every crayon I find on the floor, shelf, counter.. anywhere that ISN’T in a crayon box.
It would be fun to have them pick out the broken ones and do something like this! Can’t wait!
May 19th, 2009 at 2:21 pm
I’ve been reading about different things that can be used to mold the crayons and it seems a lot of people have success with those flexible ice trays with different designs. I’m going to check out our local craft store for candy and soap molds and if I can’t find anything I like I’ll pick up some of the ice trays to try out.
You’ll have to let me know how your kiddos like remaking the crayons!
May 19th, 2009 at 11:52 pm
I know I’ve seen a recipe that you melt in a microwavable measuring cup and pour it out, so that would work with just about any mold, huh?