Hearts Full of Color

Homemade crayon hearts.  Make them yourself or with your little ones and you’ll not only make some beautiful crayons, you’ll make some great fun.  Every mother or grandmother needs a project like this that she can pull out of her special “bag of tricks” 🙂
All children love crayons.  Little hands do really well with larger objects, as they are easier to hold and manipulate.  So big chunky crayons that are bursts of color in the shape of hearts are a guaranteed crowd pleaser among the kiddo set.  We happen to think they are lovely as well.  Every child you know will love having these to color with and make their own colorful drawings and creations.  And the process of making them is simple enough for even your really little ones to join in the fun.  Seeing their sweet faces when your little ones realize those little bits of crayon they dropped into the muffin pans come out as big, solid, multicolored crayons makes the experience that much more fun for everyone involved.

This is a simple project that once you’ve tried it, you will no doubt make again and again.  In fact, on a rainy day, or anytime you need a fairly quick, not too messy activity that children of all ages will love to participate in, this will be the project you’ll pull out of your “bag of tricks”.  Enjoy all the love, joy and abundant living you’re bound to gain creating fun with those precious little people in your life.

Homemade Heart Shaped Crayons

To make these  you will need crayons with paper wrappers removed and a heart shaped muffin pan.  Both silicone or metal pans will work.  The red silicone heart muffin pan pictured here came from the $1 section at Target a few years ago.

Target has some version of this pan every year so, if you don’t own a heart shaped muffin pan, now would be a good time to head to Target and get one.  If you already have a metal heart muffin pan or would prefer to use one, you can order it (or the silicone one) from Amazon here .

This project is a great way to use up all those little bits of crayons, those broken ones nobody seems to like using to color.  The other option is to buy boxes of new crayons from the 99 Cent store.  Removing the paper from new crayons can be a challenge sometimes, so to make this easier, place the new crayons in a glass of warm water and let them sit for about 1 minute.

The papers come off much more easily once they have been loosened in the warm water.

Next break the crayons into 1 inch pieces and sort them by color or similar colors.  For example put the pinks and reds together, the oranges and yellows, and put the blues, greens and purples together.

You can put them in the muffin pan keeping like colors together like this

or you can mix them up to make “rainbow” crayons that have some of every color.

Once you’ve filled the muffin pans, bake them in the oven at 200 degrees for 10 minutes.  When you take them out of the oven they will be runny and look like the ones here below.

Allow them to cool until firm, about 15-20 minutes.  If you are using a silicone pan you can just pop the heart shaped crayons out of the pan.  If you have used a metal pan, once the crayons are cooled and solid, run some hot water on the back of the metal pan for 10 seconds just to help loosen the crayons.  Then use a sharp knife and run it along the edge of each heart and pop it loose and out of the pan.

Now sit back and watch your little ones at work creating with their new heart crayons.

Or if you are making them for a Valentine’s Day surprise, drop some hearts into cello bags and tie them with a fun ribbon.  They would make a great gift not only for you to give your child or grandchild, but a really great Valentine for your child to give a friend.  Have fun with these and all the many possibilities they create:)