Upcycling Crafts for Kids: Fall
We’ve partnered with Tracy Williams from the Howard County Recycling District, on a series of fun crafts that encourage upcycling items that may be recycled or mistakenly thrown away at your house. Here you’ll find photos and step-by-step instructions for a simple craft you can create together with your family. This craft was inspired from an article by Nadia from Fun with Mama and took us about an hour to make in addition to drying time.
TKP Photo | Alli Lee
Supplies You’ll Need:
An oven or microwave
Baking sheet
Cupcake tin or silicone mold of any shape
Crayons
TKP Photo | Alli Lee
Remove the paper from your crayons
This will be the biggest part of the craft process and the least fun, but when many hands are working together, the job goes much faster. My boys couldn’t believe I was letting them take the paper off of crayons and break them. We chose to only use fall-colored crayons including red, yellow, orange, and brown. Some crayons’ papers were more easily removed than others. This is a great opportunity to talk or tell stories to pass the time.
Pro-tip: you could use a knife or cutter to remove the paper, but only with adult supervision.
TKP Photo | Alli Lee
2. Break the crayons and place in the mold
Pre-heat your oven to 300 degrees Farenheit. After all of the paper peeling, you can make your new crayons! We ordered a silicone mold of fall shapes to make special-shaped crayons, but you could also use something as simple as a cupcake tin. You’ll want to break crayons down to a size that fits and fills the shape you have. It’s ok to overfill your shapes because the crayons melt down to less than you think.
TKP Photo | Alli Lee
3. Place your mold in the oven
We placed our two molds on a baking sheet in a 300 degree oven for 15 minutes. The silicone molds can be flimsy, so the baking sheet gave them support and protects your oven from any spills. After 15 minutes the crayons were mostly melted and we carefully added a few extra crayons to the molds. We then placed them back into the oven for 10 more minutes. Check on the crayons often to avoid spills or over exposure. Once crayons are completely melted, remove them from the oven and allow time to solidify and cool down.
TKP Photo | Alli Lee
4. Try out your new crayons
Remove your new crayons from the mold and get coloring. Our kids couldn’t wait to start coloring, and we did some special leaf rubbing activities with some leaves that had already fallen from the trees. You can keep your crayons or share them as a sweet gift for someone else. They color really well with a little more pressure than a regular crayon, but I can tell they will definitely last longer because they’ve been given new shape and life.
Don’t forget to clean up your craft area and wash your crayon molds!
Photo Provided | Howard County Recycling District
Tracy Williams, Education Coordinator of the Howard County Recycling District, shared that it can be fun to repurpose items like old crayons.
“Repurposing crayons is a great idea! Not only does it reduce waste by keeping old broken crayons out of the landfill, but it allows you to get creative with new colors and exciting new shapes that can be great gifts for people of every age.”
We’d love to see how your bunny baskets turn out! Tag us on Facebook or leave a comment below about your favorite family upcycling crafts. What should we upcycle next?
