Making Cosmic Crayons

For my son's 3rd birthday party last year, I wanted to hand make some of the items to put in the goody bags that the party guests would take home, so I decided to stick with the space theme and make planet and star crayons, or cosmic crayons!

To get started I needed some crayons.  And to save money I decided to post a "Wanted" posting on my local Freecycle site (Freecycling is the act of giving away usable unwanted items to others instead of disposing of them in landfills.).  I was very lucky to get a large shoebox FULL of crayons!  They were sorted, and bagged by color!  All peeled, as well.  I think that just saved me at least an hour or two.  We ended up making “planet” crayons, and then I made star-shaped crayons later at home, as well.

They were so easy, almost cathartic, to make!  Auntie Becky was using a hammer to smash them and I was chopping like no one’s business. 

This cutting board (below) holds special meaning for me.  My dad, who passed away almost 20 years ago, made this before I was born.  We use it all the time at our house and I still marvel at how well made it is, and how each square was shaped to fit together perfectly.  And there are no flaws on the board, and none of the squares are separating, even after all these years.

We placed them in the oven and baked, uncovered, at 300 degrees, for 5-6 minutes.  When they were in there, I was a little worried because it looked like the different colors were just blending all together, making one yucky color. 

 But after a while in the fridge, we flipped them out of the muffin tins, onto a thick towel, and they looked spectacular on the other side!! 

I used a silicon star mold for the stars:

Yay for metallic crayons for that extra sparkly effect!    

And now for some really close up photos of crayons:

Each kid got a couple of crayons bagged up in their rocket goody bag container.

Along with some space-themed coloring pages and a few other fun space related items!

And now I'm planning this year's party.  I hope I have enough time to get the things done that I want to get done!!!