My Most Recent Craft FAIL

Remember when I said we took a trip to Dollar Tree, and I picked up all sorts of odds and ends for crafts and activities, most of them things that might not typically be thought of as craft materials? Well, one of the items I got at that time was a two-pack of plastic star-shaped ice cube trays. My original plan was to make some star-shaped sidewalk chalk using this recipe. Then, after having such a great success with my bunny-shaped scribble cookies, I was excited and wanted to try making some star-shaped scribble cookies. This was not exactly my best plan ever. I did end up with some usable scribble cookies, but the way I went about it should be classified under "DON'T try this at home!" In retrospect, it would have made much, much more sense to make the chalk first.

A couple of years ago, when we first started making scribble cookies, I tried the microwave method. I wasn't really a fan of this method at that time, and now, I am convinced that this is the entirely wrong way to make scribble cookies. I just needed to confirm this once and for all. Melting crayons in the microwave just plain stinks, literally and figuratively! It doesn't save you much time, and the temperature of the melted wax gets painfully hot if you happen to spill it on yourself or try to remove the container without a hot pad.

Since it is so hard to pour the molten wax into shaped containers like the palm tree-shaped ice cube trays from a couple of years ago without getting hurt, I decided it was worth a try to make the scribble cookies in the star-shaped ice cube trays this time. Obviously, they are not meant to go in the microwave. I knew this, but I still felt I had to try. After 10 minutes of microwaving, initially 4 minutes, and then checking again at 2 minute increments, I finally had most of the crayons melted enough to make scribble cookies. Unfortunately, I also melted 2 of the star compartments! There were at least 2 more that also got small holes in them, and although they did not melt all the way through, they definitely started leaking melted wax. (Why only 4 out of 20? Rightfully, this was such a disastrous plan, I should have ended up with more carnage.) Thus, I had melted wax on the microwave's revolving glass tray. (This cleaned up easily with a utility knife once it hardened, so at least that wasn't a huge deal.) But that's not all that went wrong with my plan. I then cracked one of the trays while trying to remove the scribble cookies, after letting them cool for an hour, and I had to use a butter knife to chisel them out, resulting in more damaged scribble cookies.

In the end, I had 7 star-shaped scribble cookies, which looked very nice, but I lost 11 others in the process of making them. That's hardly worth it to me. The good news is that I salvaged all of the broken bits for more scribble cookies which I will, from now on, be making in the oven! So, if I decide that I want to make more star-shaped scribble cookies in the future, (Fourth of July maybe?) I will need to buy a silicone mold. And I probably will because my brain doesn't seem to accept failure as absolute, just a piece of the puzzle that needs to be tweaked, and twisted, and turned until it finally fits into place. I wonder sometimes if this is how people like Thomas Edison ever felt, that if he just keep trying, eventually it will actually work out the way they envision it in their minds?

{Melted Tray = Craft FAIL!}