paint cut paste

it seems fitting to post this on imbolc/candlemas, as today is the celebration of the light shifting and spring nearing. one of the rituals for candlemas is to create candles. while we did this a coupla weeks ago, it is a nice day to share our eeeeasy (and satisfying!) candle-making activities.

we bought some sheets of colorful beeswax from a local waldorf-inspired toy store called playstore. i think it was $3 per sheet, and we got a few colors of wax, and they threw in wicks with the purchase. (each sheet we bought could easily make 6 candles the size you see pictured, which is about 4″ tall.)

N wanted to make her own candles for her waldorf birthday ring this year…. in her favorite color of course – purple!

all you do is cut the wax to the size you want the candle to be, and cut the wick to the height of the candle (plus a centimeter or so at the top.) then roll the wax around the wick.

and also super-pretty lit in a birthday ring! happy one two three four candles, my shiny daughter.

happy earth week! N and i are no strangers to picking some leaves and flowers and melting some crayons between wax paper… so we combined the two!

once again, we spent the afternoon in the yard and N gathered all sorts of leaves, petals, and flowers… even if that meant picking them from our flowerbed.

we collected them in the bottom tray from a flower pot. (it was handy.)

we gathered up some supplies, which include old crayons, a veggie peeler (to shave the crayons with,) some wax paper, an iron, and a towel.

after i shaved some of the crayons, N arranged the flowers and other findings on the wax paper and sprinkled on the crayon shavings.

when we were finished arranging, it looked like this:

we put another piece of wax paper on top, then a dishtowel. i ironed it on the maximum setting, but nothing seemed to be happening. i’d recommend using a very thin towel or cloth napkin — or you can do what i did and risk ironing directly onto the top sheet of wax paper. (somehow this worked out okay…??!?) then voila — our spring collection preserved in a sun catching way!

when i was a little girl, i used to love melting down my old crayons into new and improved crayon shapes, so i thought this would be fun to do with N this year. (for some reason, my childhood memories of melted wax involve styrofoam meat trays…??) we have a heart mini-muffin pan, which is fitting for the season. my ubercrafty friend over at pink and green mama did this with her daughter last year, as well, so i checked out her blog to learn about the oven settings.

all year, N and i have saved up broken crayons and crayons from restaurants.

N helped me to peel off the paper and break them into small chunks. (fyi: peeling cheap restaurant crayons is not the most fun task.)

we divvied the chunks up into the heart pan.

then we baked them at 250 degrees for about 15 minutes. i CAREFULLY had to carry the tray across the kitchen (minimal wax drippage onto new kitchen sisal rug. ick.) to the fridge where i set them to cool for about 15 minutes. to my surprise, they popped out of the tray very easily.

we put each one into a little valentine bag with a nametag on it and a note in it saying “i heART you” for all of N’s friends. (hey, puns are okay for toddlers.)

though some of the baby siblings of N’s friends, who are not yet in the crayon stage, got some felt hearts that i sewed for them instead.

put a little ART in your heART, valentine!

wax + colorful yarn = genius. me and the little lady are big fans of wikki stix. they’re a really cool modeling medium in string-like form that is endlessly reusable imagination ignition.

image from drawyourworld.com

i first purchased wikki stix with air travel in mind… what a great idea for something new and fun to do on a plane! then today we were in a local cafe that supplied wikki stix to kids (big thrills) and we saw firsthand what awesome companions wikkis can be in restaurants while waiting for meals to arrive.

she created her name (though blocked out for privacy)

for us, the sculpting fun can last for hours… with a lot of “mommy, can you make it into a duck?” pleading and a whole lot of N sculpting on her own, too.

i’m not getting paid by wikki stix for this pseudo-endorsement. i just wanted to shed light on a non-conventional sculpting material that is super-portable, not at all messy, and can keep our small friends creatively entertained for hours. check out their web site to learn about all of wikki stix uses (artsy and household! i.e.; they help to open jars??)

skulpsherrrr

cuteness bonus: N calls them her “sticky wicks…” and really, they seem like sticky candle wicks, so… why not?