We have a lot of candle wax lying around and multi-coloured crayons that we made from broken bits of crayons (which completely ruined my silicon moulds and did not captivate girl’s attention for long).
So, inspired by some Instagram videos, I suggested we make a candle.
First – we needed to pick a wick. We needed a tread that burned well and didn’t melt. I cut few lengths of thread from different materials and let Neva have a go burning each one to see which one suits our need better. We used a metal nut to attach the wick to and oiled the plastic pot we were going to use for the mould.
We chopped some crayons and wax from an old candle and put some in a metal measuring cup to melt and other bits in the candle mould for the colourful bits.
In our new house we have a range cooker which I am still figuring out how to use, but the hot plates on top seemed like an ideal temperature for this. So we poured the melted wax into the candle mould and left it to cool. Small person was very proud of her candle and took it with her to “listen and share” in nursery.
Neva got experimentation bug going and she wanted to see how things melt, we put baking paper on the hot plate and started dropping bits of crayon and wax on it, then decided to draw on the next bit.
Neva discovered that once cooled – the wax comes off very easily, so she had fun peeling it off the paper.
For the picture to stay intact – try doing it on a plain paper – the wax soaks in and doesn’t fall off, making a nice picture to keep. If you like this craft but don’t have an AGA with big hot plate – I think a big frying pan will do, you’d just have to cut circle to fit to the bottom and check that the temperature is not too high, so that child doesn’t burn her hands accidentally.
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