What I Made Wednesday {Melted Crayon Art}

I've wanted to do this project for a looonngg time with my son and Spring Break afforded us the perfect opportunity and time. There's so many elements he can easily help do during this project and the results are absolutely stunning.

What You'll Need
Artist canvas (white), any size but I used a 16" by 20"
Black spray paint
Bucket or some type of prop
Blue painter's tape
Crayola crayons, 64 count (don't go cheap on me here; Rose Art crayons are too oily, aren't as vibrant)
Hot glue gun and glue stick
X-acto knife
Small glass
Newspaper
Hairdryer
Alphabet cut-outs (change of plan, I ended up using white not black)
Small paint brush
Mod Podge (not pictured)

What You'll Do
If weather permits, and trust me it's been permitting around here lots, go outside to spray paint the entire canvas. Turning the canvas black was an idea I had, but many beautiful Melted Crayon Art projects have turned out just as nice just keeping the canvas white, so it's your choice. Skip this part if you want to keep your canvas white.

Prop your canvas on an overturned bucket. This helps get the sides painted easily.

Next, align your crayons in the order of color grade, in any sequence that suits you. I used 56 crayons.

Unless you want crayon wax underneath your fingers, it's best to peel away the wrapper by scoring the paper with an X-acto knife. Pick a good length to help begin the peel but DON'T peel all the paper off. You need about an inch or two of paper to apply the hot glue without entirely melting the crayon. You may get some glue still on the crayon from the wrapper. That's OK, just get all the paper off.

My son and I decided we wanted to have wording on our canvas. I wanted to go with, "I never met a color I didn't like." But, he thought it was too wordy and came up with, "I dream in color." I loved it!!! So, if you're adding words to your canvas, you'll have to cover that area with painter's tape to protect the surface and keep it free from melted wax. No matter how much you adhere the tape to the canvas surface, there will be some wax that will glide underneath. That's the benefit of painting the canvas black; much less noticeable!

Apply the hot glue to the paper wrapper only and lay down your crayons at the top of your canvas in the
proper sequence with the crayon's tip pointing down.

Take a small juice glass and prop your canvas on top of it, angling the canvas with the top side closest to the glass and the bottom canvas touching the floor. Do yourself a favor and lay down newspaper underneath the canvas all around, even the sides!

I started with the small juice glass but ended up pivoting the canvas up higher to get the flow I wanted in certain areas, at certain times of melting stage.

Set your hairdryer to high and start applying heat to your crayons where there is no wrapper. I worked in sections. It will take awhile but your crayons will begin to "sweat" or glisten. Once this happens, get ready because the flowing wax starts going and it's incredible to see. IF YOU HAVE TO, lower your hairdryer setting to keep from blowing the wax all over the place. Once the crayons start to melt, it kind of happens on its own. You can manipulate the flow by pivoting the canvas or blowing the wax in the direction you want it to go. Just don't over do it and be patient. Let gravity and science do its job! Move to melting the next section until you are happy with your results.

Right before you are ready to peel off the blue tape, give the wax on the tape a hit of warmth from the hairdryer to get it soft. You don't want to pull off your wax lines with the tape! Once the tape is off, you might have a wax line that is slightly off the canvas. Just use your hairdryer to melt it down a bit more. Next, take your letters and loosely place them on your canvas.

My son decided to take the word "COLOR" and actually color the letters (did I mention he is brilliant)!

Apply your letters using Mod Podge. First, apply the glue to the canvas. Then, once the letters are down, thinly coat the letters on top using Mod Podge.



What You'll Need to Know to Finish

To help camouflage the color variation of Mod Podged black and the rest of the black on the canvas, I painted the Mod Podge in the entire area where it was taped. Don't worry about the white glue color, it dries clear.

Now, all you have to do is apply the proper hardware to mount your canvas. I haven't decided yet whether I want it to hang from a rainbow ribbon or just mount it to the wall flush? I hope you liked this project. It was so fun, great to do with the kids, and yields stunning results!

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