I'm Melting!

Plastic beads that is, and plastic soldiers and werther's originals in fact anything really.

When I ran craft workshops I bought a lot of plastic beads, very useful for children's crafts, but what to do with them now. Well I saw a lovely idea on a Craftster forum for making light catches for the garden, it looked easy and it was.

In a 20cm (8 inch) loose bottomed cake tin I put one layer of beads, all touching each other. I placed the cake tin in a pre heated oven, gas mark 6 (200 Celsius, 400 Fahrenheit) for about 20 minutes. I kept the kitchen door and window open to ventilate the room as the melting beads, being plastic, give off an acrid smell. Warning:  I have been advised "It's really dangerous, as the fumes and such get all throughout the oven and the next time you bake food in it those fumes will be circling all around it. It's best to use a designated toaster oven that will be used for crafts only" So please ere on the side of caution, I do have one of those small ovens so will be using that next time.

Once the beads had melted and melded together I removed the tin from the oven and let it cool. When cold the plastic disc just popped out of the tin freely. To hang it I made a hole, I heated a metal skewer in the gas flame of my hob, when hot I pierced a hole through the plastic disc.

The discs remind me of the Ishihara test, the one they use to find out if you are colour blind, I can confirm there are no hidden numbers, unless I am colour bind!

Glow-in-the-dark stars mixed in with the beads seemed like a good idea, I thought they would add interest at night. Alas the stars and the beads were made from different plastics they didn't melt together. The stars popped out when cold, but I guess I could glue the stars in place. As well as light catchers you could make coasters and maybe even buttons

Now no plastic is safe.

I had a bag of cheap plastic soldiers, I just had to experiment and melt them, at this point my daughter remarked "You're like Sid, the kid in Toy Story, who mutilated toys" Dismissing the slur I carried on with my experiment and made a melted soldier coaster for my son's coffee table, he loved it.

I then turned my attention to melting sweets, Werther's Original to be precise (butterscotch really). I melted the sweets in the microwave then formed them into a bowl. I thought it would be nice to have a bowl you could eat but the next day it was very sticky so although the idea was good I'm not sure it would work that well.