December 11, 2010
12 Days of Christmas Projects – Project #8
Christmas Project #8 - Stamping on Candles.
There aren’t too many ocassions when we bring out the candles – anniversaries, birthdays and of course, Christmas. So this year, why not make a feature of your candles?
Stamping on Candles
Stamping on Candles
The name of this technique is not strictly accurate – you don’t actually STAMP directly on the candle which would be quite tricky… there is a simpler method! Read on, dear reader!!!
To decorate your candles, you will need a cheap candle from a cheap shop, ordinary tissue paper, a stamp set of your choice and inks, greaseproof paper (someone else has suggested Wax paper, but as I couldn’t find any I tried greaseproof and had no problems!), and a Heat Tool.
Stamping on candles - supplies
Start by stamping on the tissue paper. It’s a good idea to have some scrap paper underneath the tissue paper as your ink will bleed through onto your work surface. Cut around the images, leaving a small border of tissue paper.
Stamp on tissue paper
Cut around your stamped images
With one piece of tissue paper at a time, place it on your candle in the desired place, and cover with greaseproof paper. You can wrap the greaseproof around the whole candle and use the excess of greaseproof as a sort-of handle. I grasp the greaseproof paper quite tightly around the candle.
Wrap greaseproof paper around candle
Heat the area of the candle where the tissue paper is. You can get quite close with the Heat Tool, but keep a careful eye on the melting wax. If you look closely, you will see the tissue paper melt into the candle and the stamped image will become ‘brighter’. It’s almost like watching embossing powder melt – you can see it happening!! Carefully heat the whole image until it has ‘melted’ into the candle, being careful not to overheat the wax.
You will see tiny beads of wax coming up through the greaseproof paper which is really odd to see… there must be some really interesting scientific explanation (it’s beyond me LOL!) but it’s really weird to see the wax bleed through the greaseproof paper – don’t be alarmed if this happens for you. When the whole image has been heated, I removed the greaseproof straight away – you can see if any tissue paper needs heating again – and the stamped image is now magically on the candle!!! TaDAAAA!
Finished Candle
Here are some other candles I’ve stamped… (You can see that you can even colour in the tissue paper with a Blender Pen before affixing it to the candle – just be light with your blending and be gentle or you can tear the tissue paper!)
Colouring Tissue paper for candle
Santa Candles
Stamping on candles
Holiday Lineup on a candle
Reindeer on a candle
These candles also make great gifts – we gave one to each of our children’s teachers and they loved them! (My parents received one this week, too.) I’ve also kept one for our own dining table!
Stamped Candle as a Gift
I hope you’ve found this interesting and perhaps you may give it a go! Please let me know by leaving a comment if you found this helpful or if you think you’ll give this a go. Once you get all your supplies ready it really is VERY easy and fun!
Cheers! Thankyou for visiting. Please feel free to drop me a comment – I love comments!!!
X Julia.
