Sunday

A lazy guide to making candles





Well well well. It's a New Year, and not only am I here blogging *insert screaming emoticon here* but I am blogging a tutorial. Oh guys, the lolz. I don't think I've written a tutorial (bar the odd recipe) since the wedding? So, 6 years ago?  Remember when this was a wedding blog?! Me neither.

As previously mentioned, this is a lazy person's guide to making candles. I usually make gifts of the edible or drinkable variety at Christmas, but this year I had grander plans. Candles! Because when it is dark and cold what better gift than that of light and warmth? Also I love candles, especially the pretty, soy, expensively scented ones. I was pretty sure that if I could get the hang of making them then it would end up much more cost effective in the long run to do this instead of buy. So, with two sick kids and a vommiting bug behind me, off I ventured into to candle making.

Now I am not really about the precise. I like to use a lot of guess in my work. Before this crazy, sleep deprived afternoon of craft I read a few tutorials on making candles using soy wax flakes and essential oils. I got the gist and I'm not going to lie, just went for it. What lies ahead is so basic in it's instruction that it's a bit laughable. But it will get you to a lovely candle at the end, I'm 97% sure of it.

Instructions

Eco Soy Flakes
Wicks (pre waxed with metal thingies)
Containers
Essential oils
Microwavable jug
Pencils (in place of professional wick holder thingies)

I did my candles in stages, mainly because my jug could only hold so much wax. 
1) Gather all the things. Make sure containers are clean and dry.
2) Measure wax. For each container, I used approx twice as much solid (flakes) as it could hold. This ended up being a pretty accurate guide. 
3) Melt wax. Again guess work - much like melting chocolate. I started with about 4 mins then 30sec blasts until all melted. Stir with plastic spoon.
4) Add oils. I chose Lavender and Rose Geranium because I like them. I added roughly 10 drops of each per candle? I could probably have added more, I went by nose. See that accuracy I was talking about?
5) Dip the bottom of the wick (in metal thingie) into the wax, and then place a centrally as possible into the container. Hold and blow to harden wax and fix into position. A quick note on containers - one thing I loved about the idea of making my own candles is that the container possibilities are endless! I kept it pretty traditional here due to basically running out of time/energy, but I loved the bowl candle. The satsuma ones were inspired by these which are pretty but hit and miss. You'll need a little candle plate of you do the satsuma ones as they leak a little as they run out - but basically this proves that the container world is your oyster!
6) Pour in the wax.
7) Leave to set in a cool place. This is where I used a pencil to keep the wick from moving around.

I left them to set for about 24 hours, trimmed the wick and VOILA. I also made some little tags using this excellent recipe using bicarb, cornflower and water after a xmas craft session with the 5 year old. I think they worked pretty well as a little personalisation. 
So there we go, a little way to give some light and warmth in winter.






1 comment:

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