For starters, you can choose either essential oils or fragrance oils. Essential oils emit a strong odor, due to the fact that it takes a large quantity of plans and flowers just to make a vial of essential oil. Essential oils have come a long way from just being used on perfumes to now being the foundation for scented soaps, food flavoring and drink mixes. Fragrance oils, on the other hand, are composed of synthetic chemicals that emulate the scent of essential oils, making them a practical and environmentally-friendly solution.
Apart from the basic candle wax and oils, you'll also need these important ingredients and tools to brush up your candle's quality:
1. Paraffin Wax or Soy Wax
You can choose either of the two, though do note that paraffin wax is commonly used these days.
2. Candle dye blocks
These concentrated dye blocks will give your candle the desired color and shade it needs. A decent shaving of a candle dye block is more than enough to give 10 lbs. of candle wax the color it needs. You can search Google to find out more about candle colors and their meanings/significance.
3. Cold Water Baths
Basically, a cold water bath is a bucket filled with cold or room-temperature water. This process accelerates the cooling of the wax once it's set on the mold. The mold should not submerge into the cold water bath.
4. Wax Mold
There are several wax molds of the different shapes, sizes, and contours you can buy locally and online. You can improvise by using a coffee can or a something of similar structure and composition.
5. Candle Thermometer
This is a specially-designed thermometer - which, by the way, is cheaply priced - used to determine the correct pouring temperature for candle wax.
6. Kitchen Stove and Cauldron or Pot
Just like the cold water bath, the mold should not submerge into the boiling water. Keep the water level in the pot significantly lower than the height of the mold.
7. Candle Wick
Choose a wick that's the same height as your candle; otherwise trim it down.
8. Stirring Spoon
Use this to stir the wax with the fragrance and dye block shreds to get equally distributed amounts of fragrance and color.
Finally, when you have everything set, follow these easy and intuitive steps in candle making:
1. Slice and dice the wax into cubes or small chunks. This will hasten the melting process.
2. Boil the water to a desirable temperature. Make sure it doesn't go above 212 F.
3. Submerge the mold or can (which should now contain the wax) into the cauldron or pot. Don't let the wax leak into the flames below the cauldron or pot.
4. Using your thermometer as reference, keep stirring the wax until it reaches the sweet spot of 160 F. Make sure all the chunks melt.
5. When all the chunks have melted, lower the heat to a point where the water becomes warm enough to maintain the liquid form of the wax.
6. Add and the dye shreds and the fragrance. Experiment a bit until you get your desired shade and fragrance.
7. Turn the heat up a bit after you've gotten you're finished with the color and fragrance. Keep temperatures at a standard 160 F.
8. Dip the wick into the melted wax and give an allowance of two to three inches on the exposed end.
9. Turn off the stove and hold the wick for a bit until the wax partially solidifies enough to hold the wax on its own.
10. You can now submerge the wax mold into the cold water bath.
11. Wait for the wax to solidify, and then trim off any lumps or jagged edges.
Congratulations, you've now just made your first handmade scented candle!
Check out this easy step-by-step visual guide that will show you how to make perfect scented candles click here
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