Home-made Christmas Gifts, Part Two: **Spoiler Alert**

I recently bought a job lot of antique bone china teacups,

with the view to doing something with them other than drink tea. Though, I have to say, drinking tea out of a bone china teacup is really the way to go. It tastes better and forces you to sip it elegantly, rather than gulping it down the way I tend to do when drinking out of a mug.

I did think it would be cool to make something along the lines of these fabulous teacup chandeliers from Domestic Construction

Picture source found here

 
and I may, at some later stage, have a go at making a similar kind of chandelier (I quite fancy Marmite jars). But for now I decided to make some teacup candles and give those as Christmas gifts.

Home-made Christmas Gifts, Part Two: Teacup Candles.

Supplies: 

• Teacups
• 1KG Flaked soy wax 
• Wicks
• Double boiler or two saucepans that fit on top of one another
• Wooden skewers
• Sticky tape
• Scented wax block 

Steps:

1. I prepped the teacups by placing the wicks in the bottom of each cup, and balancing them in the center by taping two pieces of a wooden skewer either side of the wick.

2.  Next I tipped my wax into a saucepan placed on top of a saucepan filled with boiling water, and kept stirring until all of the wax had melted. (All wax has a flash point, so a double-boiler/bain-marie is essential to prevent it bursting into flames.) I got through 1KG (two 750g bags) of soy wax flakes to make 13 teacup candles. When the wax was almost melted, I chipped some of the concentrated candle scent into the mix. I used an orange blossom scent.

3.  When the wax was melted, I carefully poured it up to the halfway mark into each teacup. I found it was easier to pour the wax by transferring it first into a measuring jug, as the saucepan tended to slosh the wax over the side of the teacups.

4.  Once the first layer of wax had cooled, I melted some more wax and poured the rest in just beyond the rim of the teacup. Wax shrinks as it cools so a crevice will develop in the centre, but the second pour helps ensure an even surface.

5.  The last step is to let the candle cool and harden thoroughly and then trim the wick to 1cm before lighting. And once your candle has burned down to nothing, the cups can be washed with soapy liquid and water, and re-used.