One of my crafty resolutions was to make candles. This is mainly because one of the craft presents that I received from my OH’s Mum for my birthday was a House of Crafts candle making kit. I’ve never made candles before but am always eager to try out new crafts. With a few special birthdays coming up, I thought that it might be a nice time to use the kit & make some presents.

When I opened the kit a few Sunday afternoon’s ago, this is what I saw. On initial inspection I did wonder if they’d packed the wrong things & this was a rocket making kit! Then I realised that they blue things were moulds for the candles. You get two bags of wax, three different dye’s to mix & match for almost any colour possible & a small bottle of an orange scent to add to the melted wax. You also get a page of instructions, some stickers to decorate the candles, wick & sticks to hold the wicks in place.

The start of the instructions were pretty sensible. Put paper down over the worktop & wear an apron. Done & done…tho this didn’t stop wax getting on the worktop or the dye but that’s just because I’m clumsy!

The instructions don’t tell you how much water to put in the saucepan or how much wax you’ll need for one candle. So I just guessed. It kind of worked, though I did need to top up the wax as I was filling the moulds. I couldn’t get the wick to go through the taper candle so opted to use the other two. I also had two moulds that I wanted to use for the gifts so worked out how to get the wick in place. One of them was quite wide so I had to use a chopstick!

Then you wait for everything to set. This doesn’t take too long, but when I checked on them a little while later I was having a massive problem with the speherical mould. It seemed to be leaking from the center! I hadn’t overfilled it & it was kind of going everywhere! I didn’t know what to do & I couldn’t see any problem solving on the instructions so I just left it. I thought that it would have to stop leaking eventually when it set, which it did. As there wasn’t any advice on how much scent to put in, I really hope that the candles don’t smell too much when they’re lit. As they stand, the smell is quite strong! Oops!

I left them stand where they were for about 24 hours. They had a massive dip in the middle of all of them. This wasn’t a problem with the blue moulds as they would eventually sit the other way around but with the green containers, the dip was in the top. So I decided to melt the wax that had leaked out of the spherical mould & top them up. This worked out pretty well & it means that as the candles burn the wax will eventually change colour.

My hope is that these containers will be reused by the recipients for something else. The containers were bought in a charity shop in town & I think that they are very cute!

The yellow candle is for me to use in my study. It was a nightmare getting the candles out of the moulds. The instructions recommend putting them in the freezer & using a blunt knife. Even then I couldn’t get the yellow candle out & needed my OH’s much superior strength (though I’m sure I loosened it for him!) The spherical one was a bit of a disaster. I scratched the candle with a knife when trying to get it out. Plus, by the time it had finished leaking there was only half left. It looks really sad!

All in all I’m glad to have had the chance to make candles. I’ve got some of the wax left so I won’t be stopping there but it won’t become a regular craft of mine due to the fact that there’s washing up involved & potential for my ruining things!

On the whole the kit was pretty good, though I felt that I could’ve done with some guidance on how much wax to use & a few more candle making tips.

I’d certainly recommend the kit to anyone who wanted to have a go. A lovely present to receive!