Candlemaking for Dummies

After the not so successful attempt with the wax earlier this week, we decided that we needed to find a project that we could do. Ta-Da! Button Candles:

This project was also in the Gooseberry Patch Christmas books (book 3, p. 39) and I am happy to report that they were easy and fun.
What you need:

• Pillar candles
• buttons
• glue dots (the book recommends hot glue, but neither I nor my 7yo are allowed to use a hot glue gun)
• wire cutters

We already had a jar of buttons that we found at an antique store a while back. That jar has provided hours of entertainment for us. It is so fun to sift through them and make up stories about where they might have come from and the people that could have worn them. I highly recommend trolling the antique stores for collections of old buttons. They have so much more character than the newer ones.
The rest is simple. Put glue dot on button and then put button on candle in a random unpattern. M made the green and red one without any help from me.
Some of the buttons had a raised loop or hook on the back. I used a pair of jewelry wire cutters to clip that off so that they would be flat. If you do this, please be careful and take the proper precautions. I don't want to hear about anybody shooting their eye out with a ricocheting button.


**Wake up call**
On a personal note, the GBP comment yesterday made me curious and so I did some digging via Google Analytics, etc. I made a startling discovery too. People do read this blog. And I'm not just talking about my mother and a couple of letterboxing friends. While I'm not sure why, a surprising number of people are paying attention.
That is both thrilling and terrifying. No author writes in public and prays that no one ever reads it. This humbling realization means that I need to be more responsible though. So this is me...being responsible. Over the holidays I have posted a number of recipes that were not mine to post. For that I apologize. I have removed a number of posts and will be more careful in the future. The last thing I want to do is go to jail for an appetizer.

For those of you who really wanted those recipes, but didn't write them down in time, all I can say is "Buy the Gooseberry Patch books. They are completely worth it!" I have been disappointed occasionally, but it is almost always my own fault.