Slash and Burn Candle Kit

 

I made it with FIRE! 

We have a local art gallery to us called The Beetroot Tree which hosts work from very talented artists (including some of my good friends), holds craft workshops, and has a lovely cafe that sells our local bluebells icecream. All in all its a lovely little place which I have to admit I don't visit nearly often enough, especially now one of my friends no longer works there. 

  

In addition to all the lovely things above they also sell some craft kits and supplies. This little kit for a candle surround was gifted to me a while ago and I never got around to giving it a go, well today I did :) The kit was put together by Alysn Midgelow-Marsden and requires you to layer pieves of mesh fabric over one another, do some basic sewing, and then my favorite of all craft mediums - burn it!

So as you can see I have some layers above and I have sewn some wobbly lines of bead on to the top of the layers. I then cut between the layers exposing the metal mesh backing. This is when you get to use the fire! You now hold the piece over a naked flame (not too close otherwise it will burn/set on fire), but as you do, the edges wrinkle up and leave an amazing effect behind which you can see below.

Finally you sew the two ends together to make a circle and place it over a candle glass. The final effect is beautiful, even with little experience, as I really had no idea what I was doing when I started this off! You can see all the layers of different coloured mesh which I really like. The beads add a nice sense of structure and focal point to the design and the fact that it is clear so the light shines through is lovely. This is one of those things that you make and then instantly wish you had another so you can give it another go. In hindsight I think I would have added a lot more lines to make the gaps between the sections minimal. But I am really pleased with how this came out :)

Have you purchased any craft kits recently? I am always on the lookout for trying new things out so I would love to hear your favourites if you do.

Christmas Gift DIY

I am full of festive cheer at the moment. Any excuse to put on a christmas tune and have a sing a long. So naturally we are all thinking about the decorations and the gifts. 

My mum has always had a fascination with wrapping anything and everything for under the tree, something which has rubbed off on the rest of us. So I wanted to hand make a couple of the stocking fillers this year. 

All my family are huge gardeners, from my grandad to my younger sister, so naturally all enjoy relaxing outdoors enjoying the fruits of their labour. So I decided to adapt my DIY ombré candle tutorial and make these cute little terracotta plant pot candles.

They are scented using citronella which it perfect for these as it is known to be an excellent insect repellant, so great for lighting outdoors in the evening. 

I also had an excellent brainwave for the wicks, instead of tying them around, if you pull them over and then tape them to the outside using duct tape then you get a much better wick placement. 

A word if note as well if you are thinking of starting the is to plug the hole with either a bit of duct tape or cover it with a penny. 

I hope you, and they, like them. I would love to know what wonderful/quirky Christmas traditions your family have passed down, or what DIY stocking fillers you are planning to make this year.

DIY Pink Ombre Jar Candle Tutorial

I have been making these pink ombre candles in jars as part of the centre pieces for my wedding and wanted to share the tutorial with you. I hope I don't end up bombarding this place with tutorials, but hey who doesn't want to know how to make stuff right? I will try and keep the text brief and the pictures easy to follow.

Supplies:

You will need: 

Candle wax (mine came from the Norfolk Candle Company)

Candle wick (this normally come as a sort of 'string' which you cut to length)

Candle wick supports (little metal discs to hold the wick down)

Clean Jars

An old glass bowl/container

An old pan

An old plastic handles spoon

Wax crayons

Optional: Candle fragrance

Put your glass dish in a pan of hot water over the stove top. Be wary not to 'boil' the water you just want it to be simmering. Add some wax to your glass container and heat until all the solid wax has melted.

Whilst the wax is melting you can prepare your wicks. Wicks come in two forms, you can either buy them pre-cut with a metal disc on the bottom which can just be put straight inside the jars. These normally come dipped in wax so are pretty stiff and so no more support is required. The other format is wick which comes as a long string. With this type you will need to cut it to length, but make sure it is about 2cm longer than the height of the jar. Add the metal disc to the bottom and attach to the bottom of the jar. You can do this by dipping it in a bit of your melting wax. Then tie a not around a cocktail stick/pencil etc and lay across the top of the jar. This helps to keep the wick straight and centred until the wax dries. 

Once the wax has fully melted you can add your colour. You can see here I have two shades of pink crayon and a white one. Break a bit of the darkest crayon off and add it to the melted wax. You can also now add a small amount of fragrance if required. I used vanilla. Stir the crayon until fully melted. You should now have pretty pink wax.

Being careful and remembering this is hot wax sitting in hot water, lift the glass container out of the water and pour a layer of wax into each jar. How much you use it up to you and it does not need to be exact. 

Repeat these stages using lighter colours of crayon each batch (you can mix some with white to get pastel shades) until you have lovely ombre candles. Each layer should have dried sufficiently to add another by the time the next batch of wax has melted. 

HAZAA! You are left with a beautiful set of ombre candles. I can't wait to show off these bad boys at my wedding, they look so pretty with the light coming through them as well. 

You can of course do this in any colour, it doesn't have to be pink. You could also go for rainbow themed, or how about black and orange for a Halloween theme? If anyone has a go at this I would love to see a link to yours, please post a comment below and let me have a look.