the Candle Crafting Continues

I made a post recently mostly just about decorating some natural candles I bought for my wedding.  While those are turning out lovely, my passion and admiration for the gentle glow and scent of a good candle has only burned brighter.  Many times, in passing, I have thought about making candles. That fantasizing grew to be about candles that are so interesting and handcrafted with love and natural ingredients, that others may actually like to purchase them.  I have a friend who enjoys the thrills and drama of a home business, making and selling products online.  While not enough for a year-long career, she seems to really enjoy taking time from her office job in the holiday months to work from her apartment.  However, I also know people who have attempted to do some online business and it hasn't quite worked out.  So candles has never been a serious career move idea for me, but the idea still lingers as a whimsical hobby.

One day recently, I finally decided to at least get enough supplies for a candle or two and see if I could even make a candle worth selling.  Or at the least pretty enough for me to keep around the house and maybe save some money from buying candles.
Armed with some wood wicks, a hot glue gun, a box of soy wax, fragrance oils, and a melting pot...I went to work in the kitchen.  Interestingly enough and by coincidence, it was a great time to be making these candles for magickal purposes as well.  It was around the full moon, and on a Saturday, which according to my weekday correspondences courtesy of Ellen Dugan's Book of Witchery, is represented by pomegranate.  Lovely!

With pomegranate for fertility and/or prosperity, and vanilla for sensuality (great for relationships), the full moon should amp up these candles for love and prosperity.  I melted down leftover wax from a glade apple-cinnamon candle I had pretty much used up, and poured that into another nearly used candle with a wintery smell.  Tada - already rejuvenated old candles and made them usable again! :) I was also left with a nice new frosted candle jar!  The other jar I used was an old artichoke hearts container that I washed out (many times - artichoke marinade smell lingers apparently). Eco point 1 for me, reused glass jars.

 The process was actually pretty simple.  I scooped about a half cup of soy flakes (eco point 2!) into the pot.  I set it up double boiler style, as instructed by a plethora of YouTube videos.  It melted quickly and I added in the pomegranate oil and some rust-colored candle dye.  I decided to do layered candles; hey, go big or go home, right?  So I poured the first layer in after having glued down my wood wicks (eco point 3 - all natural wicks!). I had to let that cool before dealing with the next layer.

Second verse, same as the first.  I melted down more wax, this time left it natural colored, and added vanilla.  A few repeat rounds of wax pouring later... I actually had pretty and delicious smelling candles!  Not to mention, my kitchen smelled WONDEROUS.

I finished the jars off with some ribbon I had around the house.  Not too shabby...this candle thing may work out just yet!  I gave one to my friend (the one who works from home) and filled her in on all the magickal goodness that awaits her within her one-of-a-kind, hand-crafted, eco-friendly, witch's candle. She was pretty excited, agreeing that love and prosperity were certainly things she could use :) She was also shocked at how clean and pretty they looked (which I most strongly concerted with her surprise) and  planted the seed - "I think you really could sell these, especially if your going through the trouble of establishing correspondences and moon phrases into this..."  
I kept one candle for myself, and happy to say, it's still going!  I have had it lit for maybe 1-3 hours in a night, and over the course of several nights it is nowhere near half used.  I imagine it has a good 10 hours burn life in it.  I haven't made anymore yet... but will definitely try to work on that soon!