The other day, I was sucked into this endless magical alternate realm where everyone is talented and things are so easy. In this place, time stands still, in there one minute will pass while back in the real world several hours have already passed. Many of you may have heard of this magical realm, it's called Pinterest. :)
While browsing this magical realm, I happen to perchance come across a simple little project instructing someone on how to make those old timey wax seals for envelopes using crayons. Looked SO easy. I mean what's so hard about melting crayons, right?
First of all, I read the comments on the project to see if it actually worked for other people, because obviously I don't want to waste my time if it doesn't. Everything seemed to check out. One user complained about how the crayon wouldn't fit their glue gun and the commenter said they used Crayola brand crayons and it worked just fine. I never realized there was different sizes between the cheapos and the name brand crayons. So I tucked that little tidbit of info away to hopefully remember it for later. Must get Crayola brand crayons.
I stopped off at Dollar General on my way home from work because you know, they are so scarce, I think I went a whole 5 miles without seeing one...whoo, I do live out in the boonies. Hubby wanted me to pick up some stuff anyway, so I thought it was the perfect time for me to get some crayons. MUST GET CRAYOLA CRAYONS. I went into the store walked around looking at this and that when I was about to check out, I suddenly realized, Wait I haven't got my crayons yet. So I traipsed all the way back around to the front of the store where the craft section/kids coloring book area was. I saw all kinds of interesting stuff that had tons of possibilities, like some silicon baking sheets (um, those would be nice), some paint and paintbrushes with wooden items to paint (that could be fun) however, after much debate with myself (yes, yes I do argue with myself sometimes....shew..um, you do too, right? um, hopefully.?...) I decided to just quickly get the crayons and hurry up to get out of there before my resolve disappeared.
There was small packages of crayons, big packages of crayons, big crayons in small packages, soo many options. The off brand ones were maybe a dollar for one package; however, wouldn't ya know it, the Crayola one's were twice that much. The small pack of Crayola crayons was large size for small hands, whatever, that wasn't going to work. The only option was the big COOL box of Crayola crayons. You know, the huge one that has the sharpener on the back of it. When you were a kid walking in school with that bad boy, you were the cool kid, everyone wanted to know you. You were hot stuff back in preschool if you were lucky enough to have one of those babies...lol. Not what I wanted exactly for this project but, if it works, I should have plenty of wax for Christmas card season. Not that I actually do Christmas cards much but this could be an incentive for me to try again this year.
Anyway, some 50 dollars later (expensive crayons..lol), I made it home with much more stuff that I needed but hey I got my Crayola crayons. So, the instructions were pretty short and sweet, take the crayon, put it in a mini glue gun (I have had one for a very long time that I don't remember buying. Hope I didn't borrow it to never return it...hummmm, I don't think so.) and let it slowly melt onto the envelope lip area. Wait for a few seconds then press whatever you want to be your seal to be into the wax and hold it there, again no specific time frame, just until it's done. Easy Peasy, I got this.
Well, my glue gun had a full glue stick in it and it wouldn't come out. I tried to pull it out from the end and it wasn't budging. Hum, So I thought what if I just cut a part of the glue stick that was sticking out and melt what was left in the gun over a piece of paper. I wouldn't be wasting a whole glue stick that way. So that's what I did. I stated melting the glue onto some paper. Thank goodness, I did not use my good envelopes for this project, instead I used those envelopes you get when people want you to send them money. You know, utilities companies, hospital bills, people like that. Like I'm made out of money or something...haha. Anywho, those envelopes do work good for things such as this or starting bonfires. Seriously, I do pay my bills but most are paid online nowadays. Geez people, I just gotsta have my electric, how else could I use my mini glue gun?
Now in the past, while I was in that previously mentioned magical realm I saw some people take glue and create cute little designs, paint them and use them as decorations. So, while the glue was just blobbing up, I thought, hum, I might try making a cute little cross out of this and use it as a deco. Yeah, um, no. I'm not sure what I did but it for sure was NOT a cross. More like a weird blob with arms and I was getting glue everywhere.
It was after pulling glue off the gun and off the tablecloth I then came across another dilemma. My glue stick had become so short that when I pressed on the little trigger that pushed the glue though the gun, it wasn't doing anything. The glue was past that point and just sitting in the front of the glue gun not going anywhere, doing nothing, just defying me. Well, it wasn't going to get the best of me, I found me an unsharpened pencil and put it into my glue gun to force that booger out of there. It worked a little bit but I was afraid of tearing up my perfectly good pencil so I stopped.
I thought maybe I could just get a crayon to push the smug little piece of glue out. I choose a pretty periwinkle crayon. I began to peel the paper away from the crayon. Shew we, I didn't know this was going to be so time consuming. I don't know if I'm just getting old and crazy weak or if the paper on the crayons have become difficult to peel off. The way I remembered it, you just start at where the paper meets and start unfolding the top and the rest just kinda comes right off. Not so anymore, it came off in bits and pieces, small strip by another frustrating small strip. UGGGGGG!!!!!! So far, this simple project is becoming very frustrating and I haven't technically even started yet.
Okay, okay, after the paper peeling fiasco, I very calmly..(haha, I wasn't really that calm, actually rather frustrated and hoping the worse was over) placed the crayon in the glue gun. It did not fit, sigh. But I used the Crayola name brand kind. Uggg! I angrily twisted and twisted that stupid crayon while crayon shavings randomly flew everywhere until, yeah you guessed it, it broke. Lovely.
Imagine if you will, my beautiful kitchen table with the cool box of crayons sitting there open ready to be destroyed, my glue gun piping hot with a spider web of glue hanging off the end, the side and a few different places, an envelope with a weird blog man, periwinkle shavings just hanging out on my table and me with my head in my hands thinking how in the world do I get in these situations.
I proceed to take my handy dandy unsharpened pencil and push the broken crayon out of the glue gun the best I can. Then I very deliberately walk over to my utensil drawer get out my potato peeler and aggressively shave that stubborn crayon down to fit the glue gun. I wasn't about to give up now, I've already come to far on this little project of mine. I will get some melted crayon on that envelope oh yes, there will be melted crayon.
I put the crayon back into the glue gun, fits great now...lol. The handle on the glue gun doesn't quite push the crayon along though so, back to the pencil again. Using the pencil, I push the crayon through to push the small piece of glue (yeah, it's still there) out. FINALLY, the glue starts to come back out and I start seeing a hint of periwinkle. Then the real fun starts.
Quickly, I get another clean envelope and pointed the glue gun towards the center where the lip meets the back of the envelope. What happens next was not what I expected to say the least. I push that crayon out and according to that LYING magical realm the crayon was suppose to come out like the glue in a continuous slow stream of melted crayon. No, it did not, no, just no, not even close. Have you ever seen one of those paint splatter pictures? Well, yeah that's a more accurate description of what was happening.
The glue gun violently spits splatters of molten hot wax that was as thin as water everywhere. I tried to direct it all into one area thinking, hoping maybe if I got enough in one spot it would cool some to let me press some kind of seal in it ( by the way, I didn't really even have a seal I thought maybe a button at the end of some kind of wooden thing would work, probably would have just used my only trusted friend in this project, the unsharpened pencil).
I was NOT successful and still had a small piece of crayon in the front of the gun that wasn't going anywhere. I thought maybe I could get another glue stick and finish pushing that crayon out of there and maybe try to clean the glue gun (once it cooled down some). I saw that piece of glue that I originally cut off laying off to the side trying to hide from me and I grabbed it. I used it because well, I was too lazy to walk into the other room to get a whole glue stick and frankly to discouraged to worry about it. I was about to throw it all out, glue gun and all at this point. I put that half glue stick into the still hot gun to watch it finish pushing out the crayon instead it then started spitting glue (not as violently as the crayon). Figuring the crayon clogged up the tip, I tried to wipe it out while trying not to scald my fingers. It worked mostly, the glue began to flow like normal albeit with a slight periwinkle tint. I could live with that.
By this time, I have my glue blob (think I'll name him George), still piping hot glue gun, still patiently waiting for what's next opened box of crayons, unshaved crayon randomly on my table with a sprinkling of hot crayon splatters on the envelope, table cloth and me. No pretty wax seals, no pretty impressive envelopes to be mailed to friends and family, at this rate no Christmas card sending from me, well, maybe not anyway, lol.
I unplugged my glue gun and cleaned it the best I can but, I think there will forever be traces of my wax seal adventure in and on the glue gun after this day. Glad I like the color periwinkle. I threw away all those free envelopes, all the crayon shaving that I could find, my glue buddy George and tried to clean. I think my tablecloth might be permanently stained with periwinkle splatters now. It just might be time for a new tablecloth anyway. :) .
I love, love crafting most of the time, however, as this story portrays I'm not particularly good at it. Although this project seemed simple enough, it snowballed into a whole unexpected process. Just reminds me that we may never know exactly what's going to happen or what the future's going to hold. Thank goodness, there's a roadmap called the Bible to help teach and guide me for whatever my tomorrows hold. I may get frustrated and things might not go my way, but if I keep the faith and endure I'll be able to achieve the best reward possible, eternity with my Jesus, my savior and best friend.
John 14 1:6
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