Crayon Melts

One of the art projects my mom did with us when we were kids that I enjoyed most was making crayon melt pictures. I was at a loss with how to duplicate it with my children because I didn't want to purchase an expensive hot plate just for this. Imagine my surprise when while at a thrift store shopping for something entirely different I looked down and saw the very same hot plate my mother had! Now for the whopping price of $1.71 plus tax I can pass this project on to my girls.

The supplies you need are:

Hot plate with a smooth surface

Aluminum foil

Old crayons

Paper (any kind)

Hot pad

Paper towel

Place a piece of aluminum foil over the hot plate and tuck the edges so it won't slide around. Plug in the hot plate and let it warm up.

Once the hot plate is warm enough to melt the crayons let your little one draw on it.

When their picture is done lay a piece of paper over the top and smooth it down using the hot pad. We used velum sheets here because we're going to make ornaments for our tree out of these. The velum doesn't soak up the wax like regular paper does so it works better for abstract drawings. When you use plain paper the picture will transfer to it the way it was drawn. After you transfer the picture use some paper towel to wipe the foil clean and you're ready to create a new picture!

Here are our finished pictures drying. Stay tuned, later in the week we will be showing how we turned these into "stained glass" ornaments!