DIY Candles

I have been saving old candle jars for a little while now. They are far too pretty to toss into the recycle bin.  At a recent trip to the craft store Michaels I found candle making supplies. I had wanted to make candles but didn't really know where to look for supplies.  So I purchased their Beeswax, wicks, wick positioning tools, and wick holders.  When I was finished I learned that I needed way more than a 2 Lb bag of wax.  So I finished about three of the candle jars and will have to buy more. 

So here is the process I tried.

The first step is to clean out the old jars. There are several ways to do this.  I scraped out as much of the wax as I could with a butter knife.  I boiled some water and poured it into the jars to melt the residual wax and then let it cool so the wax forms at the top of the water.  Then I used paper towels over a flour sifter to drain the water but keep the wax from going down the sink drain.  After that I gave the jars a scrub with hot soapy water. 

This photo shows the beeswax, oils, wicks, wick holder, and wick positioners. All from Make Market at Michaels. 

This two pound bag makes two medium size candles. 

I was a little worried the oils would be synthetic fragrances and give me a headache but they actually smell pleasant and give off accurate scents.  This set included all four fragrances, Peony, Fresh Sage, Gardenia, and Rose. 

This Christmas jar is one of my favorites and I will have to look for a Christmas scented oil to use. 

For the wicks, I cut them to size and used pliers to clamp them into the holders.  I used hot wax that I dripped at the bottom of the jars to keep them in place. You can also used adhesive. 

The wick positioners only worked on my smaller jars so for the larger sizes I used a chop stick to hold the wicks in place.

These seem much better at holding the wicks upright. 

The wax was melted in two ways.  I tried the microwave method, using a Pyrex jar and a double boiler.  One advantage of the microwave is that I was melting the wax directly into something I could pour the wax out of. The double boiler had the advantage of melting a greater quantity of wax.  I made sure to pour the wax into the candle jar that was placed in the sink just in case I spilled it.   I decided to pour the wax into the pyrex jar instead of into the jar so I wouldn't make a mess.   I added the scented oil once the wax was melted and used half of the jar of oil per 1 pound of wax.  The color of the wax stayed nice and white. 

I am happy the way it turned out and happy I can reuse the jars.   But like I said earlier, I am going to purchase about six more pounds of wax to complete the rest of the jars. 

 xo

Cathleen