Broken Crayons

Yesterday was the last day of Christmas holidays. Katie was too sick to go out, but I wanted to do something fun with the children. Something that would cheer Katie up as well as entertain the other two. I decided that we should make our own crayons.

I announced this suggestion to the children and they were thrilled! I suggested that we all look for broken crayons together. No one moved. They told me to go and look for the crayons, and then I could let them know when we were ready to go. Like the idiot I am, I went off in search of crayons.

This search was harder than I thought it would be. Not because my little darlings treat their stuff with respect and, therefore, no crayon ever gets broken. It was because I got mad about a month ago and started throwing out any and all crayons that I came across. As a result, it was a difficult hunt.

When I had gathered all the broken crayons in the house (and broken some on purpose because I thought we should have some brighter colours in the mix), I peeled all of the paper off the crayons. This job sucked. But I did it. All by myself (I didn't say that to get a round of applause, I said that so you would envision my children lazing in front of the TV shouting "Are you done yet? Hurry up!").

I decided that I had enough crayons (which was after I sent Bethie across the street to beg for more broken crayons from Emilie).

Then I told the children to stop watching the TV and to help me. 2/3 of my offspring responded.

Then they got bored (after 2.5 seconds), and left me alone to finish it up.

I popped the crayons into the oven and waited. But the damn things just wouldn't melt fast enough. I turned up the heat...waited a moment...and then turned up the heat again. I did this until I had doubled the temperature of the oven. This was not a brilliant idea. The crayons started cooking. And they looked kind of disgusting.

I threw the muffin tin into the freezer. When I got a chance (hours later), I pulled them out.

Awful. Sarah certainly thought so. She tried to eat them! But they are super waxy, and completely ineffective as a colouring instrument. I am quite disappointed. I put a lot of work into doing these!

Lisa suggested that I should make candles. Maybe I will...