Homemade crayon candles, DIY gift idea!

Homemade crayon candles! Did you know you can create colorful candles out of wax crayons? It’s a fun project to try with kids and an excellent use for those broken crayon pieces. The process takes a few hours, so it’s a perfect Saturday or Sunday afternoon project.

You can make very cool and unique candle designs because of the many different crayon colors. We made two big rainbow candles in an empty glass and a few small ones in an ice cube mold. Especially the tiny ice cube mold candles turned out adorable and made an excellent gift idea for Mother’s Day, Grandparents Day, or a teacher. As you can see in the pictures, we decided to layer our crayon wax. This does take a bit of time as each layer needs to cool down for about 20 minutes. Otherwise, your colors will blend. You can also choose to wait 5 minutes between each layer, so you create tie-die candles.

If you’d like to try out these homemade crayon candles, please feel free to gather the craft supplies below.

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Craft supplies for crayon candles

Old or new wax crayons (make sure you use wax crayons)
Paper cups
Ice cube mold square or a heart-shaped one
Small glass
White candle wax or plain white candles
Candlewick or recycle the wick from your white candle
Coconut oil (optional)
Spoon or popsicle sticks for stirring
Skewer (or anything to hold your wick in place)
Bowl to melt the wax
Microwave, stove, or oven (all three will work to meld your crayons and clear wax)

* Before you start crafting, I want to remind you to be careful with the melted wax, especially with little hands around. And please supervise and help your kids at all times when working with a stove, oven, or microwave.

Step-by-step craft instructions

Step 1: Gather the craft supplies above.

Step 2: Fill a big pot with water and heat it on the stove. Inside, you lay a bowl with the white wax; the wax will melt slowly. When thoroughly melted, put your stove on low heat to keep the water warm and the wax liquefied. Be very careful with the heated wax, and always help your children. See picture 4 below.

Step 3: Peal the tags of the wax crayons. You can soak your crayons in water for 10 minutes and peel the labels off more easily. See picture 1 above.

Step 4: Fill the paper cups with the crayon colors you want. You can use one paper cup for each color or mix multiple colors in a cup and blend your colors. Break/cut the crayon into smaller pieces before placing it in the cup. See picture 2 below.

Step 5: Add one teaspoon of coconut oil to each cup (if you don’t have coconut oil, don’t worry. It also works fine without it).

Step by step craft instructions for crayon candles

Step 6: Prepare your candle mold. You can use a glass or an ice cube mold. Place your wick in the middle and secure your wick with a piece of cardboard or a skewer and tape. See pictures 5 & 6 above.

Step 7: Put one of the paper cups with crayons in the microwave for 1 minute. Please stir and microwave again in 30-second intervals until the wax completely melts. Heat one cup at a time and stay close to the microwave when heating the cup. If you don´t have a microwave, the oven or stove also melts your crayons (leave out the paper cup). For example, in the oven, you can place your crayon colors and white wax in a cupcake mold. But please be careful with the liquified wax/crayon and always help/supervise your kids when working with a stove, oven, or microwave.

Step 8: Mix a few spoons of white wax from the stove with the melted crayon color in the paper cup. You can use a spoon or popsicle stick to stir.

Step 9: Carefully pour the melted crayon/wax mix into your candle mold. Only fill up a small layer so you can layer your colors evenly. Help your child with this step. See pictures 7 & 8.

Step 10: Let the wax cool down for 20/30 minutes before you pour the next layer on top. After 10 minutes, you can carefully place the mold in the fridge to fasten the process. See picture 9.

Step 11: Repeat this process and pour layers into your mold; give each layer time to cool down.

Step 12. Yay! Your crayon candles are done. Wait one hour before taking the candles out of the mold. See pictures 10 & 11!

You did a great job creating these colorful crayon candles. Another fun home decor craft idea is these DIY penguin coasters.

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