Wednesday, February 8, 2012

Homemade Chalk Pastels

I checked the craft stores and online to find some Chalk Pastels. They are quite expensive for what you get so I decided to look for ways of making them ourselves.  It would also be an exciting experiment. I found some information online about making pastels using oatmeal water as the binder.  hmmmm.....

The recipe that we tried was to boil 1/4 cup of rolled oats and 1 liter of water. Strain Use the water only, it is the binder.

Mix 1/2 cup talc powder (unscented, this is the filler) with 2 Tablespoons of powdered tempera paint (This is the pigment). I had a hard time finding this but it can be ordered online. This powder mixed with water makes the liquid paint so it can be used for that as well.

Add tablespoons of the oatmeal water and mix to the consistancy of clay but not sticky.  Roll it out onto newspaper into shapes like crayons. Cut the lengths that you want and let dry for twenty four hours.

 Now we did adjust our recipe a little.. We did blue first and it was too crumbly so with the next batch I used a little more oatmeal because the binder was too week. After you have your color, you can add a little white pigment to make it a lighter shade. We had fun with this and when It dries we hope that it works. We will update with a later post.


****UPDATE****

Some colors came out more crumbly than others and some were not very smooth. All were usable. I think perfecting the recipe would work, stronger binder etc. Fun project, great for the kids and ends with art supplies. I am not complaining.


Mixing the filler with the pigment.



Rolling out the shapes.


We did slightly different shades for the blue.


13 comments:

  1. Very cool! My girls would enjoy this:)

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  2. How fun! Looks great! I know my kids would enjoy doing this, as well. :-) Coming over to visit from Red Oak Lane.
    Many blessings,
    Lisa

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  3. This is great! My girls would LOVE this!!! Thank you for linking up! I am pinning this to the Thinking Mothers pinterest boards!

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  4. Creating homemade chalk pastels does look like a fun adventure...I wouldn't have thought of it! It's a shame, though, that you couldn't find an inexpensive set. I guess we were lucky to find one quite inexpensively at our favorite craft store. But, then you would have missed all this fun :)
    Thanks for linking!!

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  5. Now this looks fun! My boys would enjoy using something they created like this!

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  6. This is great! Never thought about making pastels.

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  7. I have to say this to everyone that left a comment....Thank You. We had so much fun with this project, we could buy them and have a small set but why not have many different shades. That was my thinking anyway. I do feel that I should tweek the recipe a little more. I would like it to be smoother. I hope all enjoy.

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  8. Looks like fun and a great learning experience! Thanks for linking up to Thinky Linky Thursday!
    Lori @ Cachey Mama’s Classroom

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  9. I LOVE these! How awesome. Thanks for linking up in my Homeschooling on the cheap and I see my button on your side bar! Thanks so much! You are being featured on my Facebook page. I'm not sure if you are on Facebook. If so, stop over and say HI and your feature! http://www.facebook.com/3BoysandaDog

    Have a great weekend, Kelli

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  10. You could buy them.....but where's the fun in that?!?! I love this, thank you for linking to Hey Mom, Look What I Did on Adventures In Mommy Land!

    hope to see you again sometime!

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  11. What a great idea! Looks like they had a great time making them. Have a super weekend! Vicky from Mess For Less

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  12. What a wonderful idea!! Thank you for sharing it at Sharing Saturday! Have a great week!

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  13. Congrats! This post was the #2 most clicked link on Homeschooling on the Cheap the past week. Thank you for linking up. Stop in and link up some more ideas!

    http://3boysandadog.com/deals/2012/homeschooling-on-the-cheap-0216/

    Kelli

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