Light my fire

I really like candles.  Especially in the winter months, I think they add a cozy ambiance to my home.  The scented ones are a major bonus, because let's face it,  a home with two indoor dogs can get a little funky.

What I don't like is when the wax far out lasts the wick. I can never bring myself to just dig out the extra wax and  re-purpose the container.  I have to get my money's worth from both.  So what I usually do is collect the spent candles until I run out of spare drawer and cabinet space.  Then I do what I did this past weekend---, melt them down and add new wicks to make whole new candles.

It's really easy, economical,  and quite fun to do. All you need is a stove top, a couple sauce pans, and a few wicks. The wicks can be purchased from a craft store or a place that specializes in candle making supplies.  I get mine at Juniper Tree for .25 cents each.  Such a bargain! Unless you want to be super scrupulous about cleaning out your pans, the ones you use should be used only for this purpose.   I found a great Teflon-coated one at the thrift store for really cheap. Nothing sticks to it, so my scents don't mix unless I want them to.

First, I sort out my candles according to scent, usually I don't have enough of one kind of wax to make a whole candle so I do similar scents in layers letting each one harden between pours.  The second thing I do is choose which containers I want to reuse for my new candles.  Once I've done this, I set the whole candle into a sauce pan with water filled about half way up the candle.  I heat the whole thing just enough so I can slide a knife around the edge and pop the wax out of the container, which I then wipe out with a cloth and set aside.

Next,  I set the first candle I want to melt down into the water bath that I have just used to clean out my container.   This time I heat it 'til the wax is liquid, then I carefully remove it from the pan with a pot holder.  I then scoop out the metal piece from the spent wick with a fork, and pour the hot wax into the container that I had previously set aside.  Now,  I set my new wick in it and let it harden.  This takes between 5-30 minutes depending on how deep your pour is.  If the container is not full,  I repeat the process until it is.  

When I'm done,  I have a bunch of new candles to burn and fun new containers and drinking glasses to use.  I had 14 spent candles of various sizes to work with,  and I ended up with 4 nice new candles.  I  probably saved about $25.00, and it was fun.   You can see the fruits of this weekend's labor in the picture above.