How to Make Crayons and How to Make Play Dough are both easy to follow Earth Day Activities. I love the bright colors and they make me long for spring! They are predicting shovelable snow next week so let’s concentrate on spring crafts instead of thinking about snow!
These Earth Day Craft Activities can be made with kids or if you are like me, they can be made by adults and given to the kids in their lives. Every kid seems to love crayons…except for my son Zack. He is very talented at drawing and has always preferred using pen and sometimes pencil. Same thing with play dough. What kid doesn’t love it? And when they can help make it, that is even better! So, I am going to share how to make planet earth crayons and how to a make play dough.
I showed the earth crayons to my husband and asked him what they looked like. He said they look like bottlecaps. I asked him to guess again and he said, “Earth?” When I told him yes, he said, “They aren’t the right shape.” So, if you are like my husband and can’t look at a circle and imagine a sphere, just bear with me on this one and pretend they look like earth crayons!
Every year, my kids bring home their leftover crayons from school. The older they get the less they use crayons so many of them are still in great condition. We put them all in a box and their little cousins use the crayons when they come over. I’ve used them to make pumpkin crayons for fall and when I saw these earth crayons by Sandy Toes and Popsicles, I had to try them. To make the crayons that look like earth, first preheat the oven to 250°F. Peel the wrapper off of blue, white and green crayons. We love Crayola crayons so that is what I used to make these.
Break or cut the crayons into small pieces. Start by putting a few white pieces in the bottom of a muffin tin. Top the white pieces with the green and blue pieces. The more crayon pieces you add, the thicker they crayons will be.
Bake them at 250°F for 15-20 minutes, until the crayons are melted. Carefully remove the muffin tin from the oven without mixing the colors. Allow the crayons to cool on the counter and then put them into the fridge for 30 minutes. When I removed them from the fridge, I turned the muffin tin upside down and gave it a smack on the counter. All of the crayons popped out. I have heard of people spraying the muffin tins with cooking spray first but that wasn’t necessary.
The recipe that I used for making the play dough is one that I received from my mother in law. She made this play dough for my teen when she was little! I noticed that it is very similar to the recipe Arty Fartsy Mama share in last week’s link party but it uses 2 teaspoons of cream of tartar instead of 2 tablespoons. Put flour, water salt, cream of tartar and canola oil in a saucepan.
Divide the dough into how ever many pieces you need for the colors you want. I was only making green and blue. Put several drops of food coloring on the dough and carefully knead it until the color is uniform. Be careful not to get the food coloring everywhere! Add more food coloring if desired.
- 1 cup flour
- ½ cup salt
- 1 cup water
- 2 tbsp canola oil
- 2 tsp cream of tartar
- Food coloring
- Mix flour, salt, water, canola oil and cream of tartar in a large saucepan.
- Cook over medium heat, stirring constantly, until a ball of dough forms.
- Remove from heat and when the dough is cool enough to touch, knead until smooth.
- Divide the dough into the number of pieces needed for the desired colors.
- Add drops of food coloring to the dough and carefully knead until the color is uniform.