Homemade Toys for Toddlers - Recycle Dry Markers to New Icy Watercolors!

I know you have dry markers around somewhere! Well, if you have kids, you surely have plenty of these! Somehow, no matter how often I repeat: "Close your markers when you're done, they will get dry!", my girl seams to forget to do it almost every time! :) So, I've decided to reuse some of our felt tip markers to make some watercolors! And freeze them for additional fun! It's summer after all!

What you'll need:
- old dry markers
- plastic cups (one for each color)
- popsicle sticks (one for each color)
- water
- freezer! ;)
- later on, I realized I'll need precision knife too... read it down...

What you do is:
- take apart markers and get the inserts with color
- pour water in each of the plastic cups
- cut the marker insert open with precision knife (it will help color to blend with water faster, we tried with plastic wrap on and it took ages!)
- place insert in cup with water and stir
- do it all over again with all the other markers you intended for this purpose
- you'll end up with something like this:

CAUTION: I've used some really cheap markers we received as a gift and they were not washable! If you have markers that are not washable, make sure to protect working surface as well as your own hands! I got stained with color all over my hands and now I have multicolor nails! ;)

After you're done with mixing colors, place them on the tray or directly in a freezer (if you don't have enough spare space like I usually don't!). After approximately 1 - 1,5 hours add popsicle sticks in each of the cups (or wait until water is half frozen).

I have left them over the night in our freezer and here is how they turned out:

As you can see, it's leaving really soft, watercolor like lines. Now, the biggest problem with these might be... will you have enough paper for all the artwork your kids will make with these new "old" art supplies?!

Here is one of ours finished... think it will be wonderful for wrapping paper or some background scrapbooking! ;)

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