DIY Gifts - Eggshell Candles

Alright, I bet you thought I forgot about showing you our DIY projects didn't you. :)

I wouldn't forget! 

But I have to admit, I am rather slow on the uploading of the pictures I've already taken.  Or is that downloading? hmm.  Well I did my part, I took the picture. :P

Ok, here is one of the easier projects that we did as a Christmas present for my daughter in law.  Angie absolutely loves candles and is quite into holiday themes so we tried to come up with something that she could use throughout the whole year, not just one.  We decided that a present of eggshell candles would be a great gift for her.  I gotta admit though , once we delved into this project we almost forgot our objective.  I had seen these made when I was a child and they had holly leaves and berries painted on them after they were set.  Then placed decoratively on the table to create a wonderful christmasy centerpiece display.  She almost got holly leaves and berries on them too, just not for the same reason.  Just in the nick of time we remembered not to paint them!  Read on to find out why ...

Now I'm an avid DIY'er and make the candles from scratch most of the time.  So already having the materials here to make the candles we set to work eating eggs for the next couple of days.  (ALOT of eggs!)  Now, we eat alot of eggs anyway, but when you have to be careful how you break the eggshell it becomes a bit more interesting. So we ate ALOT of eggs and picked the best shells for the project. For this project we used home grown eggs as they're a bit thicker and more durable than a store bought egg.  haha  (I needed all the help I could get, so we went straight to the top... 'er bottom of the matter! lol)

Wanting to keep the colors soft, I opted to use the soy wax and instead of using the wax dye, Way donated his old crayons to the cause for that "personal" touch.  Then added some wonderful berries smells to each batch.

I'm a paraphin phenatic, so soy wax was definately a new experience for me.  I wasn't sure the paraphin crayon would meld well with the soy, so we ate a few extra eggs just in case. haha

With paraphin, the general rule is to take a test drop and allow it to cool.  That color is the color of the candle.  Ok, I broke rule #1, I didn't do a test drop.  Remember I'm used to paraphin. lol  So imagine my surprise when I check back on our little eggs and find they are allllllll pastel colors.  Ok, not what I anticipated at all!  Here's where we lost our objective.  We decided ok, we can make this a good save by painting holly leaves and berries on them to give them a bit more color.

As I was peeling them, oh I WISH a regular egg peeled that easy!  And if there was a nick in one, it smoothed out very easily with a quick rub of my thumb.  Wish all my deviled eggs turned out looking that good. haha.

Anyway, it occurred to us that Angie really likes pastels and if she wanted to use them for other holiday occassions, those holly leaves and berries really wouldn't work out so well.

So we left them plain and unpainted.  Giving her the wonderful DIY possiblities to share with my granddaughter Zoey... by painting hearts on them for Valentine's Day, Shamrocks for St. Patricks and of course the wonderful holiday of Easter with tulips and butterflies.

Which by the way............ I want pictures of that! :D

Here's the pictures of our DIY Eggshell Candles..

We'll call these the cream of the crop. lol

The hardest part was making sure only the tops were cracked off.

That really took some practice after successfully breaking them in half for 20 years. haha

This was or first batch.  As you can see they're all lined up all in a row.

Well after this batch, I decided that separating them a bit would be easier to pour.

Here, they're spread apart and the pour was alot quicker, easier and less messy.

But then I sneezed and got it all over the place! lol

Good thing I thought ahead and put down some newspaper. hehe

Now you'll notice there isn't a finished picture. Ya well, my batteries died waiting for me to finish peeling one!  See, you have this whole mind set when your holding an egg shell.  The concept is simple... it's fragile!  And when you thump an eggshell, one has to remember not to bang it too hard or what's inside ... well crushes like an egg. haha

Well it took me quite a bit to get past that mind set.  Finally I just BEAT IT ON THE COUNTER and it finally cracked!  Wow, talk about a tough nut to crack. haha

I did take some pictures on my phone and i'll upload (or is it download?) those and edit this post to add the finished pictures to this post in a day or two.

We were well pleased with our DIY eggshell candles and the wonderful berry smell they left lingering in the house.  We packaged them in an egg carton and hand delivered them with a big smile.

That was a double duty DIY for me as the soy wax did wonders for my dry hands for at least a couple of weeks! lol

**EDIT:  I finally got those pictures uploaded.. err downloaded... oh whatever it is. .. I finally got them off my phone, on the laptop and now to their final destination.  This post!  So here is the picture of what the Eggshell Candle looked like when it was finished.

These are the cutest little eggs.  Easy to work with too.  As you can see from the one laying on it's side there is a nick out of it.  I took my thumb and rubbed that spot a few times and it rubbed right out. 

I stored them in the egg carton I poured them in and handed them over to my test panel for their trial test.  (My daughter in law LOVES candles.)  I will make another post when the test results come back.