Let’s Make a Crayon Painting • Crayon Art Projects

Crayon Painting • Artchoo.com

Okay, I’ve finally seen just enough crayon painting projects that I decided we had to try it. We’ve done our kid-friendly encaustics and wax spiral project, but now it was time to get all melty with crayons.

I’ve seen some wonderful crayon painting rocks that people put in the oven, remove and draw on. In fact, one of my awesome Facebook fans posted hers on my page the other day. Did I ever mention how much I love when people post their kid projects on my Facebook page? I do! Do it!

crayons

Anyway. For this project, I wanted to see if a larger stone surface could hold its heat long enough to continue melting the crayons, and we had fun during the process. We used the backs of 12×12″ marble tiles from Home Depot.

It may seem like an easy task to go pick up some stone tiles to use, but most of them have grooves in the back, so we used luxurious marble tiles.

For the first go-round, we heated them up in a 200 degree oven for 20 minutes. This worked well for a bit, but you need to work fast or the marble loses a lot of heat. As you can see in the first tiles, some of the drawings are really melty, while the rest are dry. The girls worked with this and used the sides of crayons for the backgrounds, where the crayons picked up the tile texture.

Crayon Painting • Artchoo.com

 

Crayon Painting • Artchoo.com

 

On to experiment #2. We heated the next tile for about 30 minutes at 250 degrees. Bingo! Fen worked faster with this one, and got awesome results.

After she drew/painted on her design, she used a card to drag out lines from the center through the other colors.

Crayon Painting • Artchoo.com

 

Crayon Painting • Artchoo.com

Please remember: If you do this or a similar project with your kids, keep dishtowels under the stones, and warn the kids repeatedly about the hot surfaces. The heat stays insulated within the marble pretty well, so the surface won’t be as hot as metal, but there is still the potential for burns.

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40 thoughts on “Let’s Make a Crayon Painting • Crayon Art Projects”

  1. We tried the melty crayon thing for the first time a while back and it is SO COOL isn’t it! I think I had just as much fun as my big kids did…. and now you have me wondering about using tiles and maybe putting paper over out pizza stone… hmmmm…

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  2. Absolutely gorgeous!! So glad you found the right formula. My kids are still too little for me to trust that they would do this safely, but I can’t wait to try this with them in a few years!

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  3. I am a preschool teacher and have been crayon painting for years using a warming tray. You can get them at Walmart and Target. They are used to keep served foods warm. Cover the tray with aluminum foil and just plug it in! I use wax paper as my canvas. So simple and it stays warm enough to melt the crayons for as looooong as the artist wants. It is definitely hot to the touch but won’t burn the skin (always use with adult supervision). It is so relaxing 😉

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    • Yeah- I feel that way when I do certain projects, too. It’s sooooo hard to share sometimes. But that’s why we bought a box of tiles instead of just 2 or 3. Make some! You’ll love it.

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  4. I love drawing with unusual surfaces and materials. Great project! I’d love to try it with my daughter. Could you varnish the surface when it’s cool and dry to protect the artwork?

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  5. I really love this, when I was volunteering at the hospital one of the things we did with the elderly people is hot glue crayons to a piece of canvas and then use a hot blow dryer to melt the crayons and turn the painting so the wax runs every direction… very cool 🙂

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  6. I have also used the warming trays or electric griddles (on low) and it works great with freezer paper as a canvas. Just reading the post I’m wondering about perhaps also using pizza stones for older kids – I have a big rectangular one I got at a kitchen supply store and it stays hot forever.

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    • Oh, the pizza stone is a great idea since it retains its heat for so long! I think we might try some freezer paper drawings today. It’s hard to stop making these once you start!

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    • We just did another round on the tiles yesterday- our last 2 tiles 🙁 but I’m pleased with how long they stay warm for the crayons; it’s just really fun for kids to use such a big, solid surface, too!

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  7. I make crayons to give to children in hospitals with my leftover crayons. First, have the kids peel them, then sort them by color.. then melt them in a glass jar in the microwave.. then pour them into molds. I do this and place one of each color into a zip lock bag. Kids love them..

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    • You know, my stepdaughter was a camp counselor this past summer and she did that with her campers. They looked so neat, especially the ones where there weren’t too many colors all jumbled in together. Another great way to use up crayons!

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  8. Have you ever done this on glass? How long does the wax crayons remain on the tiles? Does it eventually chip or flake off the tiles?

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    • Hi Sherri- We haven’t had any trouble with chipping or flaking. The crayon seems to melt really nicely into the tile- but make sure you use the back of it (or a porous tile). I haven’t done it on glass, but I imagine the crayon would chip off of the glass easily since there’s really nothing for it to adhere to. I wonder if the crayon would even stick onto the glass in the first place come to think of it…

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  9. WOAH JEAN! Someone’s been paying attention! Amazing that your daughter thought of the Card drag and what an Incredible result!!!! Mind Blown that this is crayon!!!

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    • I think it’s so funny that people just started experimenting with lowly crayons a few years back and came up with really fun projects to do with them- which is great, since if you’re a parent you no doubt have a plethora of crayons floating around!

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  10. Now that we are in the middle of the COVID-19 crisis, this seems to be a great activity for everyone at home

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