Adventures in Candle Making-Day 1

(attached wicks to containers with hot glue)

(Centering the wick with pen caps. Clever, no? I came up with that one all by myself.)

Since it's the craft du jour (everyone seems to be blogging about it), I decided to try my hand at candle making. Since this was my first attempt and was starting small, I purchased a 1 lb package of microwaveable soy wax flakes, a package of 5 candle wicks and a small bottle of Pineapple Cilantro fragrance. The wax flakes were purchased in Michael's and the other items were from Hobby Lobby (they seemed to have a somewhat better selection of fragrances.) I usually save my glass jars and lids from pantry items (the two I ended up using today happened to be jars from Trader Joe's salsa) so I used these as my containers. There are many tutorials on line about soy candle making. Here are a couple that I referred to during my trials: How to make soy container candles from Apartment Therapy

How to make a soy candle from Wedding Bee

Day 1: Given my klutzy nature, I was actually nervous when beginning this project. I was not sure I could be trusted around wax around 160 degrees. I armed myself with two oven mitts, covered all kitchen surfaces in aluminum foil (I didn't seem to have a newspaper around) and went at it. Although nerve-wracking (oh, the hot wax!), this was not a difficult endeavor. The most surprising part was that a pound of wax only made two candles. I was expecting more, given that everyone (on their blogs) keep exalting how inexpensive handmade candles were. My two candles ended up costing about $6 a piece. Not a huge expenditure, but for some reason, I thought I'd end up with four candles. Guess it depends on the size of your container. I've read that you need soy candles to "cure" for about two weeks before you burn them. Let the wait begin. It will be a few weeks until I know if these "throw" (that's an official candle making term) fragrance when burned. Here's hoping! My first concern is that I added too much fragrance to the candles, I used the entire bottle of fragrance (it was only .5 oz) in these two candles and shortly thereafter, it was really stinking up the place! And making my little allergic nose itch a little. (Perhaps this isn't the hobby for me. Ha!) But a few hours have passed and either I'm used to it now, or it has dissipated. I also received a coupon for 40% off a item at Michael's today, so I think I'll get another pound of wax. Have to at least use up the rest of these wicks! Giving it another go tomorrow. Next time with essential oils.