Making homemade crayons is a fun and simple gift that saves old, broken crayons from being dumped in the trashcan!
Here are a few more ideas we think your kids will LOVE – Puppet Show Puppets, Grandparent’s Day Gift, Bubble Painting, and Chalk Ice Activity.

In addition to the backpacks full of papers and notebooks that come home on the last day of school, I find myself always cleaning out pencil boxes full of random markers, pencil shaving, and broken crayons. (Anyone else feel the same?)
Instead of tossing everything in the trashcan, make some paper notepads from the scrap paper, and make some homemade crayons from the old, broken ones!
Making homemade crayons is a great summer activity to do with the kids that takes no time to prepare and it won’t break the bank. Best of all, it gives all those sad, small crayons new life, which means less waste, and more of a chance they’ll be used by the kids.
Here’s how to make them –
How to Make Homemade Crayons from Scratch
YOU WILL NEED –
- CRAYONS – Broken into small pieces with the paper labels removed. (This can take a while, so get the kids involved with this!)
- MUFFIN TIN – You can use any size and any shape. I used a mini muffin tin.
- TOOTHPICKS
DIRECTIONS –
Place a pile of broken crayons into various spaces of a muffin pan. You can mix the colors for a marbled look, or keep it monochromatic. (Both ways are super fun!)
Stick the filled muffin tin into a 275 degree preheated oven for 10-12 minutes. Take them out, stir each section with a toothpick, and then let them cool on the counter for a few minutes. Cool completely by sticking them into the refrigerator for 10 minutes.
Once they are completely cool, turn the muffin tin over and the will fall right out and look something like this:
They are now ready to use and just waiting to be colored with! Grab some paper and get creative, there’s a whole new activity waiting right at your finger tips.
Have a great summer!
Thanks for giving me a fun little project to do with my 3 year old today!
This is way too cute! I am making some for my daughter’s 4th birthday this week (it’s an Art themed party) and going to add them to the favor buckets I’ve put together. Instead of the typical round or heart shaped crayons I’ve been finding the most online, I bought the Wilton mini-gingerbread man silicone pan and I’m going to make little people shaped crayons! Can’t wait to see how they turn out! 🙂
that’s an awesome idea! I just made some for my joy’s birthday party goodie bags.
just brilliant! a perfect use for old and broken “useless” (according to my 5 yr. old)
crayons. I was needing a filler for the goodie bags! so simple! why can’t I ever think of
stuff like this?? 🙂
Thanks!
(p.s. – there was definitely an edge that was just wax with no colour, but you rub that away
and you got to the colour. and I used a complete mix of brand-names and el cheapos.)
(p.p.s. – mine were also tres thin as I had a lot to make and not a lot of crayons to work with)
Why do my crayons not color after I melt them?
That is a good question. I am not sure. That has never happened to me before. My crayons worked just fine. Where they cheaper crayons you melted? That maybe could be a reason. But, I honestly do not know. I am so sorry.
Susan, see what Pumpkin commented…I found it sooo right! It makes sense, now that I think of it, that the wax in the crayons might separated from the pigment, so it would be like trying to color with a candle. I am going to try to do Pumpkin’s method, and maybe use a stick to swirl the colors by hand. More grown up fun!!!
Using a mini-muffin tin is genius! We just reorganized our crafting supplies and put all of our broken crayons into a bag. I think I’ll have the boys make new crayons today. Or at least get them started on peeling off the wrappers. We did a craft a few weeks ago where you melt crayons onto rocks to make “gem stones”, and 90% of the craft time was spent shucking crayon wrappers. 🙂
I would like to add that they look fun all mixed up colors but if you put related colors together you will be more satisfied with the result when you are coloring? Too many colors mixed up turns a not so pretty shade of brown. My kids are grown now, but I think I can scout down some old crayons and have a little grown-up fun too!
Thanks for the fun suggestion!
p.s. I think this would make an awesome “homemade” birthday present for a little one with a big roll of plain white package wrapping paper, don’t you? (great use for all of those crayons)
Never thought to use a mini muffin tin. Cute idea!
How Fun! We have a ton of broken crayons. This will be great for my kids. Thanks
This looks like fun! Too bad I’ve been tossing all of our peeled and broken crayons, my 3 y.o. is a chronic crayon peeler and destroyer :). Now I have something to save them up for.
Oh this is such a great idea and they turned out just so cute!!
The only problem with popping all the crayons into the mold together and then melting them is that the wax will tend to separate from the pigment, so that you have a thin layer of wax at the top that’s no good for coloring with. When I’m doing this project as a grown-up only version, I melt each color separately in old tomato sauce jars, stir it to remix the wax and pigment, then pour it into the molds. It makes a layered crayon, not a marbled one, but it is really nice to draw with.
Be sure to not use washable crayons…that’s what happens with them, not regular ones!
No, it’s not that. We don’t use washable crayons here. Pretty much the only washable art materials that I can stand are the washable markers that we sometimes buy, and even then we only use them for coloring book pillows.
When you do it in the cans do you microwave them to melt it or do you stick them in the oven?
I use the oven. I sort the crayons roughly by color into different jars or cans, set them all in a big baking pan protected with foil, and melt them that way. I stir each color up with an old chopstick to mix the wax and pigment, then pour the wax directly into the molds, letting each layer solidify a bit before I pour a new layer. I make crayons every now and then, so I store the jars, with any unused wax still inside, up on a high shelf until I need it again.
Very cute idea! I have a ton of leftover crayons!