Living Room Redo - Dipped Candles

So I am no different from any other woman in America right now. I spend way too much time on Pinterest. I have been looking for ideas for the living room and I came across an idea from Martha Stewart. You can access the tutorial directly by clicking here. So I gave it a shot this morning. It was something I could do quickly, cheaply and easily from my Mom's house. I had no supplies here so I hit up the Hobby Lobby. 

This wax cost $4.29 just like it says on the box. It came with 3 bars that look like soap (one is sitting on top of the box). I did not even use a small portion of one of the bars. 


After I left Hobby Lobby, I went to the Goodwill. I don't have a double boiler, and I am funny about using the tools I use for cooking food for my family for craft projects so I wanted to see if I could get a crock pot for cheap. Cha-ching! How often do you go to Goodwill and get EXACTLY what you went in for?

Next I went to the Dollar Tree. Here I wanted to get several different sizes and shapes of white candles, but they only had 1 size. Short and stumpy. I was not going to go home without at least trying so I got 2 of them and a box of super cheap crayons.

The colors of the new living room are blue, black and white so I chose a blue crayon. I also needed a sharp knife, a plastic knife and a few paper plates. Just like when cooking, I like to get all of my supplies prepped and ready before I begin so I shaved the crayon onto a paper plate before I turned the crock pot on. Martha Stewart said to use about a quarter of a crayon, but I did not want to be unprepared and seriously what am I going to do with 3/4 of a shaved crayon so I did the whole thing.

 I also shaved the wax and put it into the crock pot. I did not use much, maybe 1/8 of the bar. I filled the crock pot about 1/2 way up and when it melted down it was about 1/4 full. 

When everything was ready to go I plugged in the crock pot. It took about 30 minutes for the wax to melt completely. I started by adding 1/2 a crayon into the melted wax.

I put the lid back on and let it melt a little more for maybe 5 minutes and then I stirred it around. This is what it looked like when I was done. 

My first attempt did NOT look like the picture. I have a couple of theories about this. It could be that I did not turn the crock pot off before I dipped my candle, or it could be that I did not use enough crayon. This is what my first attempt looked like.

You could barely see the blue and the hot wax sort of melted the bottom of my candle. 


One funny little thing. I forgot to take the sticker off of the bottom of the first  candle. Once I started to pull it up I looked into the crock pot and noticed the sticker floating around in the hot wax. I used the plastic knife to pull it out.

I unplugged the crock pot and put in the rest of the crayon and then shaved another blue crayon from the same box and put it in and let it melt. Then I tried again. 

Again I forgot to take the sticker off! I could not believe it! Anyway this time I got much better results. Here is what my second attempt looked like.

When I did this project I sort of swished the candle around in the wax. I was afraid the candle was going to melt more. Next time I will set it in flat and see if I have better results. This way there was a little splatter on the top of the candle. I was able to scrape it off. 


Here is the final result I am going to make a few more in different heights and widths and put them on a cute tray and place them as a centerpiece on my next project!

Love,
Mary Gina Carr