In our newest art for kids activity, we’ll be creating art using sandpaper as the canvas. You can even take the project a step further and use an iron to turn the finished crayon drawings on sandpaper into sun catchers!
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I’m so thrilled to be teaming up again with some super creative bloggers in the Easy Art Projects for Kids Series! Our last post in the series was Splatter Paint & Tape Resist Art! This week we’re focusing on crayon art. Be sure to check out all the fun crayon art projects for kids shared by the other participating blogs. I’ve included their links at the end of this post! (This post contains affiliate links.)
Art for Kids Using Crayons and Sandpaper
Drawing on Sandpaper
My kids probably use crayons almost everyday for drawing and coloring, whether it be on our easel or in their art journals. I thought it’d be fun to explore a new way to use crayons by drawing on sandpaper!
We bought sandpaper in a variety of grit sizes to use for our artwork. We were curious if the various textures would affect how our crayon drawings looked.
The kids and I sat down together at the kitchen table and began drawing on the sandpaper. Lucy noticed how the crayons felt funny as they ran across the sandpaper. She also pointed out that the drawings were a bit harder to see on the coarser sandpaper.
This was a wonderful sensory art project for Theo. After each mark he made on the sandpaper, he’d run his finger over it to see how it felt.
Melted Crayon Art- Sun Catchers
After making all our drawings, we couldn’t resist turing our finished artwork into melted crayon art! We were so excited to see what would happen to our pictures if we warmed them with an iron onto some paper.
I covered our surface with a towel, and then turned on our iron and set it to medium. I placed our crayon art face down onto some blank paper and ran the iron slowly over it for about 10-15 seconds. (You might want to protect your iron by placing another piece of paper between your sandpaper and iron.)
After warming the sandpaper we gently lifted it up to find out what happened. The crayon had melted onto the blank paper creating a duplicate of our original picture. So fun! And the melted crayon art had a unique look to it because of the texture of the sandpaper.
When we held up the melted crayon art, we noticed that the melted wax had made the paper more translucent. As we saw the sunlight go through the paper we just knew we had to make the melted crayon art into sun catchers for our window!
We cut out some frames from construction paper and placed our artwork inside. Then we hung them in the window to admire!
Be sure to check out these other easy art project for kids using crayons:
Melted Crayon Art with a Glue Gun from Learn Play Imagine
Crayon Transfer Technique from Artchoo
Crayon Resist Photo Display from Twodaloo
Crayon Art Sculpture from Meri Cherry
Crayon Painting from Babble Dabble Do
Melted Crayon Art for Easter from Blog Me Mom
SO fun! I love when you get into a project and then another idea pops into your head, so you have to bop on to the next idea to see what THAT will look like. I’m pretty sure we have some sandpaper around here I can dig out for today. Our giant crayon box is still out, of course. 🙂
I LOVE this! What a cool way to do a suncatcher- you know I’m a sucker for those 😉
I just love how this project is extended into a second activity and sun catchers!
Chelsey, awesome post and pictures.. We love crayons and sandpaper too and your suncatcher is gorgeous.
Wow! It amazes me some of the creative things people come up with to do with every day items. Thanks for sharing! That’s really neat!
These turned out fabulous. I love the sensory experience of drawing on sandpaper too! Great idea to turn them in to sun-catchers – we are going to have try that soon.
You can also iron the sandpaper and crayon art onto fabric to make neat patches.
I love the craft/art ideas. Thank you for posting!