We had a whole fun morning of beeswax on Friday. I have a box filled with 1 lb. beeswax blocks we got from a local beekeeper mama, and this was the perfect time to bring it out. Days are cooler, dark comes earlier, and there is nothing like the smell of melting beeswax and beeswax candles.
To get started, we first collected a bunch of beautiful red leaves from our backyard maple and pressed a whole bunch in our flower press for craft projects later.
We let the rest dry on the tablecloth (dewy morn) while we melted beeswax in the double boiler. While it was melting we got everything ready. We covered the table with paper, put water-repellent aprons on the boys, cut our wicks and got our small pots ready to pour wax into, and set out a heat-proof pie plate to hold the pot of wax. I chatted with A & G about what we needed to do to keep it safe (and clean).
When ready, I set the beeswax on the table in the pie plate, and as I held the pot the boys carefully dipped each leaf in the beeswax, and set down onto freezer paper to dry.
We then let the leaves dry - we have a few fun projects planned, so we made several dozen. We've made these before - they are so beautiful! We got the idea at In These Hills. Dawn made a nice mobile with hers this week.
We re-heated the wax again after the leaves were done, and then made dipped candles. Using a long wick, we dipped and dripped, dipped and dripped until each boy had a small beeswax taper. They are a little misshapen, but they burn just fine and the boys love that they made them.
For the last bit of wax, I poured it into prepped pots. To get those ready before we started, the boys painted the inside of 3" ceramic pots (small) with copper paint. I added a leaf and stripes on a few. We let the paint dry. We placed a small bit of special candle wax over the bottom drain hole to plug, and then put our pre-dipped wicks in place. I just needed to pour the remaining beeswax into the pots and we have votives! Nothing wasted, and many great projects completed with just one pound of beeswax!
We have a few ideas for those leaves, so stay tuned!
17 comments:
Denise, these are beautiful projects.
Every time I come to your blog, I am impressed by your artistic abilities and the beautiful photographs.
And your boys look like they have had great fun!
I can just smell it now! We haven't done our beeswax crafting yet his fall.
You are one crafty, and inspiring Momma! I love this craft! We do not have beeswax in the house, haven't seen in it then quantities that you describe, however, we have quite a few leftover candle pieces that we can recycle. I do believe this will be on our craft list for this week!
Love the photos, and your boys always show how much they enjoy the project they are working on.
wonderful. you are so clever and crafty.
p.s. i just had to comment on the books you've got listed in your sidebar.
fantastic! i've put all of them on our christmas list.
Wow, what a great craft, we have been collecting and pressing Maple Leafs (a favourite of mine) and I've been thinking of pressing them between waxed paper for a similar effect, however, I'm loving the bees wax idea! I'm anxiously awaiting your craft idea for the waxed leaves.
Your blog is so very inspiring.
Those are lovely! We have some beeswax somewhere in a cabinet..I'll have to pull it out now. :-)
Wonderful project! I just love beeswax, it smells like home to me! I am looking forward to seeing the leaf projects you come up with. Oh and the apple prints are so adorable!
Ooh, I can just smell it! I keep eyeing the local honey brands here, thinking, I wonder what they do with their beeswax....
Beautiful!
I so want to do this but we are in Spring full swing.
I'm still getting confused about where we are & what season it is...silly huh? XXxx
Oh how funny is this - we did the same thing last week. And boy did it smell good.
Lovely leaves.
I SO want to do this!!
The little votive holder is just precious:)
simply impressive :)
We dip our leaves in wax to preserve them, too. :)
deinse - i want to get out our beeswax and do some leaf dipping! it still needs to get a bit warmer here in texas though. :)
I so remember the sweetness of those projects when my kids (now 20 and in college and almost 17) were younger. Savor and enjoy them!
Aw, this takes me back. We dipped leaves for Brady's 5th birthday party years ago, and had a nature scavenger hunt and then used the collected items to make wreaths. In fact, we JUST used up the rest of the beeswax in the very same pan we've been storing all these years - but this time it was used for skate boards. LOL
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