Crafts

Great Stuff : Crafts

Shop Value Village for inexpensive candles to use for this project.

Supplies Needed:

Candles: Choose them in whatever solid color you prefer. Pay attention to scent. If you use your tea-lights most often in the dinning room, make sure that the candle you are using is unscented or a complimentary scent to food such as citrus or spice.
Protection: Newspapers on the counter top or work surface in several layers. On top of that an old cookie sheet or two.
Tea light cups and wicks: Tea lights and tabbed zinc wicks. *
Melting: One small saucepan with spout or lip that pours well to use inside a larger pot of boiling water.
For any remaining wax: Clean, empty cans.
For finishing: A sharp scissors for trimming wicks and packaging materials if you are giving as a gift. If not, any shallow hard sided box will work best.

Recycling Candles into Tea Lights!

Soft candle light always adds a nice touch - no matter what room you're in. Making tea lights is a quick and easy project that takes very little time and effort. Making a set in a color that you know your friend will love makes a great hostess gift when she has a dinner party - and it's economical too! Value Village sells all types and sizes of candles that can be used for this purpose. Value Village carries pillars, tapers, jar candles etc. Ninety-nine cents usually buys a bag of candles containing 4-6 tapers. Pillars average about 99 cents to $2.99 depending on the condition. Any of these will do so as long as the color is solid throughout.

As for the tea light cups and wicks, there are many on-line resources to try. One of them is RusticEscentuals. If you really get into the process and want to venture futher than tea lights, there is an on-line resource that appears (from a beginner's point of view) to be a good starting place - CandleAndSoap. When you find a candle color you love but not the style or condition, this is a great way to make it work for you and it's a fun project to do. In a recent session, about 100 tea lights in 5 different colors were produced by one beginner in a little over an hour.

Safety note: This project is best for adults and older kids with adult supervision. Melted wax is hot stuff! Be careful with work surfaces - choose an area where a spill could not cause permanent damage from heat or dyes from the wax, use pot holders, pour carefully and don't move the tea lights until they've cooled.

Instructions:

Prepare the candles:
1. Remove all labels, decorations and burnt portions of the wick from the candle(s).

Prepare your work surface and tea lights:
2. Protect your working surface with flat layers of newspaper. For your tea light cups, an old cookie sheet with no or low sides works well.
3. Set the tea light cups on the cookie sheet. Place a wick in the center of each.

Melt the candle:
4. Boil water in the larger pot. When it starts boiling, put the smaller pan inside filled with the old candles you want to melt. The color will change a lot when it melts, but returns to the color it started once it resets completely in the tea light cup. As soon as the wax is melted, remove the pan from the boiling water - be sure to use a pot holder to protect yourself.

Pour into tea light cups:
5. Carefully, pour the melted wax into the new tea light cups as full as possible without causing overflow. Set aside a small portion of the melted wax for filling in a second time after the tea light sets up as the wax might shrink a bit. Straighten the wick if necessary before the wax begins to set.
6. (OPTIONAL) If you notice any shrinkage, melt remaining wax and top-off each tea light to completely fill the cup.
7. If there is unused melted wax at this point, pour into a clean empty can. Store it covered to melt for the next project. Discard any residual elements in the bottom of the pan such as the old wick.

Finishing touches:
8. Wait for the tea lights to completely set up (about an hour) - don't move them while they are hot.
9. Trim the wicks to approximately 1/4 of an inch each. Clean off any spills.
10. If you're going to give them as a gift, you might look at some creative packaging ideas. Organization and stationery stores are good bets for finding something that will work well.

* Both tea light cups and zinc wicks can be purchased on line at RusticEscentuals. This site is specific about the quality of their materials. Though they may not be the least expensive, you can be confident in what your're getting. Save on shipping fees by ordering both products with one company. There are lots of candle making supply sites on-line - some offer clever tea light and votive kits so check them out. Craft stores tend to carry candle making supplies in much smaller quantities and therefore the price per tea light can get costly quickly.