Baking Crayons

When I was very, very young, my mother took me (and probably the other girlscouts too, but it's been a while so the memory is not crystal clear) to a convention that was based around children. I can't remember what she was presenting at her booth, but she let me wander freely around the area, as this was a younger and more innocent time. A few booths down was a nice lady who had really cool chunky crayons, and I kept coming back to her and talking with her, becuase I thought the crayons were way too cool. Finally, she gave me one as a present for keeping her company, and I was very happy with my prize. What happened to it after that, I could not hope to tell you, but I'm sure it's in a box in the basement somewhere.

Fast forward twenty years or so, and we've got a box of old, broken crayons that sit on my desk and take up space. While browsing around online, I saw suggestions for melting them down, and it reminded me of that childhood memory... so I decided I'd melt them down and turn them into chunky crayons for my cousins.

I took a small muffin tray, (meaning, not making full sized muffins), sprayed the inside of it with Pam, broke about three crayons into each well, and put them in the oven at about 400 degrees. There doesn't seem to be an exact science for this, and that temperature worked really well. I spent some time unwrapping other crayons for the next batch, and when I looked, the wax was melted. And the house smelled like melted wax, but there you go. They took a lot longer to solidify again, and they weren't all that easy to remove. Most popped right out, but about four had to be pryed out with a knife, so they're a bit rough around the bottom edge. I wiped the Pam off of them, an easy task, and voila! A nice dozen new crayons!

One Note- silver metalic crayons will melt to a green.