How to Recycle Old Crayons

Crayons are relatively cheap and easy to replace, so when they get broken, we tend to just throw them out. Instead of sending them to the landfills, collect them in a bucket and recycle them. The following will show you several ways to recycle your old crayons.

Things You'll Need

• Old crayons
• Baby food jars
• Candy molds
• Muffin tins
• Waxed muffin cups
• Skillet
• Aluminum foil
• Matches
• Easter eggs
• Candle wicks
• Jars

Instructions

1. Donate your crayons to Crazy Crayons. Crazy Crayons melts down old crayons and recycles them into new ones. Go onto their website to get their mailing address to send your crayons.

2. Melt old crayons into baby food jars by setting the jars on a skillet. Pour them into candy molds and let harden to make new thick crayons in interesting shapes. Separate them by color or mix them up to make interesting-looking crayons.

3. Separate your crayons by color and place them in waxed muffin cups in each section of a muffin tin. Melt them in the oven at about 250 degrees Fahrenheit and monitor them closely. After they melt together, you will have round crayons that you can re-use, which are great for small hands to use.

4. Cover a skillet with aluminum foil and place different colors of peeled crayons onto the foil. Let them melt and lay a piece of folded construction paper on top of the melted crayons. Press and let it sit a few seconds, then lift the paper and set it to the side to dry to make a cute card to give to your friends.

5. Melt the crayon into a puddle on the aluminum foil. Dip the tip of matches into the melted crayons. This will damp proof the match, making them great to use for camping trips.

6. Use old crayons to draw on your Easter eggs before color dying them. This will make interesting designs on your eggs because the dye can't penetrate the wax.

7. Create multi-colored candles from your old crayons by melting them in a double boiler and dipping wicks into the wax or pouring the wax into a jar over the wick. Give them away as gifts.

Tips & Warnings

• Keep some of your old crayons in your toolbox to use for marking pencils.

Resources

• Crazy Crayons