melted crayon heart banner

My intention was to get this craft posted this weekend, as it was a Valentine's Day craft idea... but, a stomach bug had a better idea.  My oldest was up all night Saturday sick and then woke up again Monday sick.  Yuck!  Needless to say I spent the weekend disinfecting and didn't have much time for bloging.  But, it's a cute idea and doesn't just apply to the Holiday.

Supplies:

-iron

-scrap paper (2 pieces)

-crayons

-wax paper (2 pieces)

-dish towel

-pencil sharpener

-small hole punch

-ribbon

First, set up.  Because you'll be keeping your iron on the lowest setting (no steam) there's no need to haul out your ironing board.  Just lay down a clean dish towel to protect your counters.

Put down the scrap paper, then the first piece of wax paper.  This is where you'll put the crayon shavings, and eventually cover with the second piece of wax paper.

Peel all the paper off your crayons, great job for the little ones.

I taped my scrap paper (white) and first piece of wax paper, to keep it from rolling back up.  If you don't have tape handy you can always enlist the help of a dinosaur, or two.

Using the pencils sharpener (I started out with one with a plastic blade and quickly switched to a metal blade) sharpen the crayons and let the shaving fall where they may on the wax paper.  There's really no rhyme or reason to this part just make sure you keep them to the center of the paper.

Cover with your second piece of wax paper.

Then put the second piece of scrap paper down.  You'll be creating a kind of paper sandwich, scrap, wax, shavings, wax, scrap.  Turn the iron on low and once it heats up glide it over the scrap paper.  You don't want to press down or hold it in one spot for too long as it will burn the wax.  All you're doing here is heating the wax shavings enough to melt, it doesn't take much.

ta-da!

Did I mention the importance of the scrap paper?  This is what happens when A) the crayon shavings are too close to the edge and B) are too thick.  A thin layer of the shavings is all you need.

Once the paper is cool, draw or trace hearts (or whatever shape you desire) onto the wax paper and cut out.

I used a small hole punch and some ribbon to make a banner.