Another Cute Christmas Craft

This one is super easy. It requires no extraordinary or expensive products...you likely will have most of the few things needed on hand. The project consists of adding an image to a candle. The image can be a photo you took, a stamped image, a copied image. How to get it onto the candle? I'm going to tell you briefly and also give you a link to an in depth tutorial. It will take longer to write/read this post than to do the actual project.

I don't have an image of the candles I've altered (they've been given as gifts) but you can scroll down-- in this post-- to see an example of a Halloween candle or you can view another example at this link--click here --which also provides an in depth tutorial as well as images that show the process step by step.

Here is a brief overview of how to make these:

Choose an image. (Note-- the size of the candle will determine the size your image will need to be.) I've used a digital photo from my camera, which I downloaded to my computer, then reduced to a wallet size image using my printer software. You could take a photo you have, or any image, and shrink it with a copy machine. Or you can use a rubber stamp image. Shoot--you could draw an image.

Now here's the trick--you must print your image onto tissue paper. How to do that? Take some white tissue-- not colored-cut it to the same size as a sheet of copy paper and tape it to the copy paper. I do that by wrapping the tape to the back side of the copy paper...and I tape each edge in two places..you don't want it to get wrinkled, at least not in the position where your image will be printing. Now copy/print your image onto the tissue paper. I didn't have to hand feed mine, just put it into the paper tray.

Once you have your image to size and printed onto tissue paper, cut it out and apply it to your wax candle. How?..the link shows you step by step. Basically, you lay the cropped image flat on your candle, over wrap it with a strip of wax paper to cover and hold the image in place--make the strip long enough so you can hold the excess/ends at the backside of the candle .

Now, you apply heat. The tutorial says to use a heat gun..I don't have one, so I used my blow dryer and it works perfectly. As the candle heats, the wax melts and the tissue paper disappears into the candle. The finished result is your image as one in the candle!

Here's an example of a finished Halloween candle using rubber stamped images.

Image from about.com

This is such a neat trick. For Halloween I did orange votive candles, using a black cat and jack- o' lantern rubber stamps to make my images. I packaged them by placing some paper grass in the bottom of a clear cellophane bag, added some ribbon to tie it shut, and a rubber stamped tag. My daughter loved it.

I also took images of her pets, reduced them to fit a candle and placed on a candle. She loved it. You could make the candles and add some matches, decorating the match box.

As I said, you can do this project in less time than it takes to read or write this post. And you can make it very personal by using images of loved ones--pets and humans, or special places, or sayings.

Check it out at the link above. I think you might like it. It is really super easy. There are no hard parts. Pick up some candles, choose an image or two or three, print onto tissue, melt into your candle. C'est finis! Tout suite!!