Kids Arts and Crafts Activities

How to Make Melted Crayon Rocks

September 6, 2023

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Melted crayon rocks are made by “painting” on hot rocks with crayons. The crayons melt as they touch the heated rock and make a lovely painted effect.

Updated October 2023

Aren’t these melted crayon rocks beautiful? This is something we’ve done a few times over the years and is one of our favorite ways to decorate rocks.

Here’s how to do this super simple rock art activity. Trust us when we say, you’ll want to make them over and over again!

How to Make Melted Crayon Rocks

MATERIALS

Small, smooth rocks
Crayons (to protect fingers, do not use short stubs)
Oven
Baking sheet
Towel or mat to protect your table
Foil

INSTRUCTIONS

Gather your rocks
Go for a walk in your neighborhood and look for smooth rocks. Gather up a small collection of them and wash and dry them completely.
Heat your rocks
Spread the clean rocks out on a foil-lined cookie sheet and put them in a 350-degree Fahrenheit oven to heat up. It usually takes about 5-10 minutes for them to get hot.

Once the rocks are hot, we transfer them one or two at a time to a protected surface to work, leaving the rest in the oven.
Protect work surface
We protect our work surface with a cloth and a piece of foil. The foil works to catch the melting crayon and the cloth helps to keep the hot rock from damaging the table surface.

You should also use an oven mitt or wash cloth to protect little hands from hot rocks.
Decorate!
Simply press a crayon to the hot rock and watch as the heat melts the crayon and creates a smooth, vibrant, colorful coating that hardens into a waxy shell.

The melting crayon is so liquid it’s like painting with crayons. You can use one color or several. Make designs, swirls, dots, stripes, faces, whatever you’d like!

These melted crayon rocks are really fun and easy to make. And they are perfect for pretend play! Use them to tell stories, with sensory play, or anything your kids come up with.