Sun catchers!

 Melted Bead Sun Catchers

I saw this really cool idea on Pinterest and I just had to try it! I thought that it would be a fun craft project for the kids and I to do!  I bought a 2 bags of 450 pony beads at the Dollar Tree.  I poured both bags out into a pan and had the kids start to sort out the colors that they wanted. Well, Jacob, being only 3, got bored pretty easily.  I started working on his.  I have an old jar of beads that I have had since I was a kid and I pulled out some clear regular beads to mix into the pony beads.  Shianne and I sat and straightened out the pony beads, pulled out the colors that we didn't want and then sorta made a pattern.  I used regular red, yellow and orange beads on the border of Jacob's and then just filled it in, so that the bottom of the pan was full.  I had taken all the pinks and purples out of Jacob's and given them to Shianne to use.  I helped her straighten out her beads and I put clear beads on the edge of hers and made a pattern in the middle.

Jacob's mix! 

Shianne's mix!

Now, you take these and put them in the oven, at 400 degrees, for 20 minutes.  I had read on the site where I got the idea, that it can get pretty stinky in the house, with the melting plastic and all, so have your house open and fans blowing.  But it also said that you can do it in a toaster oven OUTSIDE, so that is what I opted to do. I started inside, but as soon as it started to stink, which it was pretty nasty, I put the toaster oven outside.  Worked out perfectly!  I kept checking them and I ended up letting them bake for around 30 minutes, so that they were completely melted and flat!   You let cool and then they pop right out of the pan and don't even leave any residue! Wow! I was a little worried about using my pans, but it worked out pretty well!

 This is what it looked like when it came out of the oven

My little toaster oven doing all the work, outside! 

Jacob and his! 

Shianne and hers!

Now, theirs turned out so pretty, I decided to do one myself! We had used up all the pony beads, but I had these regular beads in my bead jar. I just put beads in there, until the bottom of the pan was full. 

This is how mine turned out!  The funny thing was, that there was this one bead, at the top in the middle, that didn't melt for some reason! Well, there is my hole for the string!

Mine

 They turned out so pretty! 

 This was an easy project to do! I just highly recommend that you do it outside!  Now, the rest is going to be up to Daddy!  You take a tool and drill a hole in it, so you can hang them to be your pretty sun catchers!   Next time, I have to get more beads, I am going to make them in muffin tins, so I can hang some little ones together on a dowel!