While the big kids are away, the little kids will play.

Monk (11), Twinkle Toes (9), and Measle (7) have gone blueberry picking with Nana in East Texas, so we're down to just two kids!  I wanted to do something special with the little kids while the big kids were away, so I asked American Boy (4) what he wanted to do.  The first adventure on his list was going through the car wash.  Little kids are so easy!  This worked great for me since I also needed gas and a new inspection sticker.  Next it was my turn to come up with something fun and when I saw Smockity Frock's Tutorial Tuesday post on making jumbo recycled crayons I knew that was it.  I've always wanted to do this, but never have.  Connie linked to Make and Takes for the actual tutorial and I followed the instructions step by step. 

To make this little project both fun and educational I thought I'd ask the kids about their colors.  When I asked big brother if he knew his colors he proudly rattled them all off to me.  When I asked Lu (20 months) if she knew hers, her matter-of-fact reply was, "No."  She didn't seem too interested in learning them, either.

As you can see Lu was a little confused about what we were doing.  She must associate unwrapping with lollipops, so naturally while big brother and I were popping crayons into the muffin tin, she was popping crayons into her mouth!  I decided it was Lu's naptime.

Doesn't he look proud?  We had company pop over while we were working and American Boy repeatedly described our important mission to them.

I know, I know, totally boring, right?  I just couldn't bring myself to mix the colors.  Maybe I can work up to that.

I did try to go a little crazy with this alternate version of the jumbo crayons, mixing shades of green and pink.  As you can see I either had a warped cookie sheet, warped cookie cutters, or both.  Too bad, but then you can't win them all.

Doesn't that smile just say it all?  He's so proud of his muffin tin crayons!