Butterflies Flutterby

Sierra had a blast today making butterflies!

I am sure most of you have made the melted crayon shavings between wax paper to make a sun catcher before but have you tried this method? It's much easier, safer and kid friendly then the traditional way.

These suncatchers were made with a warming plate (instead of an iron), wax paper, old crayons, and some construction paper cut in the shape of a butterfly body. I picked my warming plate up at a thrift store for $5.99. It's older but it worked like a charm!

The warming plate does get hot to the touch so have little hands becareful! Sierra will be 3 in June but she was quite capable of doing this activity with the warming plate. She did touch her fingers a couple times, and it is hot, but not hot enough to burn when turned down low. (at least mine isn't. Be sure to check your temperature after it is warmed for at least 5 minutes, to see how hot your plate actually gets.)

First we laid the wax paper onto the warming plate, then we used old crayons (remove all wrappers) and rubbed them over the wax paper. The plate is warm enough to melt the crayons and leaves streaks of beautiful melted wax colours on the wax paper. Crayons can be used by rubbing their sides, or as a writing utensil. Sierra was quite amazed at watching the colours melt and mix.

After Sierra decided her paper had enough colour, we set it aside to cool. (this only takes a minute or so) I then cut out a butterfly body shape from black construction paper, she drew on a face, white I cut the wax paper into a butterflies wing shape. Then the body was taped onto the wings, and we hung it in our window. It looked great with our left over Eggs we made for Easter. (I guess I should really clean my windows before posting any more pics of things on my windows. Finger prints and smudges are free at our house if any one needs some! )


Sierra then had fun with the magnifying glass looking at butterflies, flowers and pinecones.


I though this would be the perfect time to share with Sierra our newest shipment from mamakopp. We just received her wonderful wooden butterfly lifecycle set as well as these two adorable gnomes.
(The felt butterfly puppet, caterpillar and egg set I made today, and will be listing one set in the shop after this post)

The picture is a bit blurry but Sierra spent quite a bit of time searching through our butterfly books for the one that matched her puzzle piece and she was so ecstatic when she found it!

I hope you give this melted wax idea a try. It's simple, cheap, a great way to use up unwanted broken crayons, just in time to get in the recycling mood for Earth Day!