With two kids under 3, washable crayons are a mom's best friend. Lucky rarely uses coloring implements unattended, but he has "accidentally" drawn on the wall and the floor a few times. With washable crayons, I can wipe it right up and be on my merry way.
We have a lot of other random crayons in the house. Crayons from when I was younger, crayons from restaurants or on-the-go activity kits. Some crayons (washable and non) that are too "broken" for Lucky to use. When he is older than 3 I might be able to reason with him to still use the old crayons, but there is no reasoning with a threenager. Plus, this is going to let me do a craft project I've been itching to try... make my own rainbow crayons!
For a while I saved the broken washable crayons in their own container so I could melt just the washable versions. I gave up on that since I don't want to guarantee to the people I give these crayons that they are washable when that might not be true.
It is a lot harder to remove dozens of wrappers than I expected! Especially with 9 month old Rowdy trying to help.
I had a silicone candy tray (link is equivalent product) that is safe up to 450 degrees. This would be perfect for making some party favors for Rowdy's Dinosaur Birthday party in January. I can put these little dino crayons into Easter eggs for the perfect favor.
After 5 minutes not much melting had happened, but the crayons are starting to look "wet". I'm sure that my results would be different if all crayons started out the same brand or even a similar age.
It took a lot of self control to not keep opening the oven. I knew that if I kept letting all of the heat escape that it would take longer and longer. A watched crayon never melts?
I let the crayons sit in the oven a total of 30 minutes and then let them completely cool on top of the stove. Before trying to pop them out, I stuck the cooled (solid crayons) tray in the freezer for 10 minutes. The crayons popped out easily and none broke!
Did you even make one of those melted crayons over a candle bottle growing up? I LOVED melting wax! This wasn't quite as satisfying as watching crayons melt in my hands, but I bet that my toddler would LOVE to color with these when he wouldn't touch many of the crayons I used to create them.
Can you tell which of the above crayons was the chippy triceratops? It is in the upper-mid-right of the above photo. If I had enough chips to fill the whole mold maybe there would be more of a significant difference, but it doesn't stand out too much from many of the other dinosaurs.