I got into beeswax candle making around Christmas time, so naturally I decided to make advent candles! In the post and video, I dye and dip my own advent candles, but you can follow the same process to make taper beeswax candles for any occasion.
I delved into the world of beeswax candle making because we harvested wax from our hive for the first time this fall! I wanted to make something special with the wax, and since advent was right around the corner, this was the perfect project to try!
For more information on how to render beeswax without equipment, check out my post here.
In spite of all of the chaos, this was such a fun project. The wicks I used came in the dye kit I bought on amazon. They are for poured candles, not tapered, but I made do with what we had. It definitely made things more complicated because the wicks were so short, I couldn’t pass them to my four-year-old assistant (my son) without one of us touching the hot wax. So he became my cold-water assistant!
In general, it felt so calming, therapeutic even, to dip the wick in the wax repetitively, with the sound of the constant boiling water, and the wax smelled amazing! I’m definitely sold on beeswax candle making.
It’s been a couple months since I made the candles, and they have gone through an advent and Christmas of use. Here are some pictures of how the honey still in the wax has crystalized:
Questions about beeswax candle making:
What is the difference between making beeswax dipped or taper candles and poured candles?
Taper candles: to make taper candles you dip the wick in wax repeatedly to make the classic column-like candle that stands in a holder. It is a long process, but I definitely found it worth the effort for the beautiful results!
Poured candles: to make poured candles you attach a wick to the bottom of a glass or jar and pour in the wax. This is definitely a simpler process.
If you want to learn about how to make your own poured candles, check this site out here.
What are advent candles?
Advent candles are a Catholic tradition. Each of the four candles is lit on a specific Sunday during adventi. There is a specific prayer and meditation that corresponds to each week of advent. Each candle is named after the week that it represents.
For the first week of advent, only the first candle, called the Hope candle, is lit. People either sing an advent song or pray a prayer the corresponds to the particular candle. On the second Sunday of advent, both the Hope candle and the second candle, the Peace candle, are lit. Each Sunday another candle is lit to join the others.
As with most old traditions, advent candles are rich with symbolism and meaning. They have so many, in fact, that I won’t attempt to get into it, especially since I don’t even know all of them!
What is advent?
Advent is a time of joyful preparation for Christmas. The word “advent” is derived from the Latin verb “to come,” signifying our anticipation for the coming of Christ. For Catholics, Advent is a time to think about and prepare oneself for Christmas, but also for the second coming and death. It begins the fourth Sunday before Christmas, and it ends on Christmas day.
This does not need to be just a Catholic tradition. There are so many meditations and scripture passages that correspond to each week of advent, and I think the candles themselves are beautiful.
There is a lot of research to say that children have more solidity in their upbringings and security in themselves and their parents when they are brought up experiencing traditions. Any traditions. Simply the repetition of special things each year, be it as simple as the Christmas tree, singing certain songs, or a very specific cookie, is so good for children.
I don’t remember where I learned that, I think I’ve actually heard it from multiple different sources. I will link to the research when I find it, but off the top of my head I remember that Rudolf Steiner shaped his Waldorf philosophy much around this research. Just food for thought.
Where can you buy wax for beeswax candle making?
I didn’t buy wax, but I always go to Farmhouse on Boone for recommendations on things like that. If you go to her site, you may as well check out her dipped candles tutorial for more information.
Because of how incredibly amazing the candles smell from our own beeswax, I’m very biased to fresh-harvested, locally grown wax, something that hasn’t been filtered as much so it can smell, feel, and look as beautiful and luxurious as my candles!
Can you use other types of wax for candle making?
Yes! Although I’m not interested in making candles if not from beeswax. I know there are lots of survivalist hacks you can find for burning all types of oils and waxes as makeshift candles. They are interesting to me as a resource, but I don’t see the point in putting in all the hard work to make a candle if it might be toxic!
Can you add other oils to your wax?
Yes! I didn’t do this but I want to try adding my pig’s lard to the recipe to see what happens. I also know people can add things like coconut oil or tallow.
Where do you buy the wicks and dye?
You can buy what I bought here, and I did think the dye was great, but I would really recommend either making or buying better wicks. They were not only too short for the dipping method, but they burned faster than my candles, so one week into advent my candles would burn out within minutes of lighting.
Can you make your own wicks and dye?
Yes! Hopefully by the time people read this post next Christmas I will have figured out how to dye my own advent candles with berries or something.
I have my own bees, how do I filter the honey and wax for beeswax candle making?
I have a post on how to render beeswax with minimal supplies here.
We used a paint filter and a food-grade five gallon bucket. We do not have an extractor. Then I put the paint filter in a pot of boiling water and left it to cool. The wax melted and rose to the surface of the water, and it was very easy to pull out. I needed to melt the wax and filter it a second time before making the beeswax candles. I used an old stocking and it worked perfectly.
Is wax really hard to clean?
Sort of, but I think it depends on what you get it on and how you deal with it. Go to the tips section on how I cleaned wax and what I learned. The basics of it are: either freeze or heat the wax, depending on what it’s on.
Some extra tips about beeswax advent candle making from lessons learned in the process:
1. Don’t let the wax go down your drain!
It’s worse than bacon grease for clogging your drain, so just don’t do it.
2. Use a narrow vessel or lots of wax
Make sure you have enough wax for your candles! Every time you dip your candle, more wax adheres to it, lowering the surface level of the wax in the vessel. You don’t want your candles to turn out looking like funky triangles! However, I actually had this problem a little bit, but I thought the candles turned out so well anyway.
3. Before beginning your beeswax candle making adventure, have something laid down to protect your counters, sink, and stovetop from the dripping wax
Paper towels, aluminum foil, an old towel, whatever you have handy.
4. If you are worried about the color of the candles, pour a little wax into a disposable cup and add the dye to see what it will look like
I didn’t do this but I will in the future. I’m so happy with the way my candles turned out and I loved how easily the dye I used worked, but it’s hard to control the shade and I was actually surprised by the resulting colors, as they weren’t what I thought they would look like.
How to easily remove wax from surfaces:
There are two methods I tried, but there is a third method I would love to try if I had a hair dryer that worked on solar powered electricity, but we live off-grid and that’s just not a possibility right now.
Method one: freezer method
Good for: bowls of wax, utensils, even clothes. This method worked the best for thicker layers of wax, especially in my stainless steel bowl
Step one: freeze the waxed object for several hours, at least 5
Step two: take out of freezer and immediately chip away the wax with a butter knife and your fingernails.
Method two: hot water method
Good for: items that have just a thin layer of wax leftover, wax that is so thin that it would not chip away in chunks if you froze it.
Step one: boil some water, enough to fill your container. If your container is a pot, fill with water and set to boil on the stovetop on high.
Step two: when the wax is melted, turn off the burner and allow it to cool for several hours, at least 5. If it’s cold outside you could put the bowl outside.
Step three: After the wax has completely cooled, it will have risen to the top of the water. Simply pull the wax off of the top.
Notes:
- When I did this, I cleaned out my big pot that I melted the wax in, and I just put any utensils I used into the pot. As the water heated, the wax melted off my utensils and rose to the surface of the water.
- I ended up putting the pot outside to freeze overnight and do the freezer method after I pulled off the layer of wax, because it still left small drips of wax on the pot above the surface of the water.
- I also used my silicone spatula to scrape off all the hot wax and scrape into a bowl lined with aluminum foil. The easiest thing would be to heat up the pot and wipe it out with paper towels if you don’t want to save the extra wax.
There are other ways to clean wax. Here are three videos I found most helpful:
How to make your own beeswax advent candles
What do you need for beeswax candle making?
Necessary Supplies:
- Wick (you can either make them or buy them. Here’s a link to a helpful post I found about making them yourself.)
- Container the same height as the dipping vat filled with water.
- Beeswax (you can buy pellets which are easier to melt and measure)
- A container to melt the wax (I first melted my wax in a stainless steel bowl over a pot of water double-boiler style. I hope to take a second video showing you how to clean wax off of everything. For now, I wrote out what I learned cleaning wax in the tips section.)
- Scissors.
- Candle holder for reference. It wouldn’t be fun to make candles and have them not fit in your holder, although there are tricks to fix that. Check out the tips section.
- Hex nuts. I found in a how-to that you need one for each candle, but I think this is only the case if you are dipping multiple candles at a time. One nut for each candle you are dipping on the same rack.
- Dye to make three purple candles and one pink candle for advent, or any dye for birthday candles. This is the dye I got. I really regret not trying to figure out how to dye beeswax naturally using cranberries and blueberries or something, but this particular one I selected actually worked out great. It says it’s non-toxic, and it mixed so well with the wax.
- A towel for drying the candles.
- Aluminum foil to put everything that gets wax on it.
- Plastic utensils to stir in the dye.
Optional Supplies:
- Dipping Racks (I couldn’t even use them if I wanted to because the wicks I bought were for making poured candles. As you can see in the video, I didn’t have tons of wax so having a kit with tiny wicks worked out perfectly. Here’s the kit I bought.)
- Dipping Vat (I didn’t have one so I used glasses. I definitely recommend using something else! I’ve seen people diy them or use cans or something. Farmhouse on Boone uses wide mouth jars.
Beeswax candle making: How to make beeswax advent candles
Make sure you have everything ready: the container of water, the foil to protect the counter, the plastic utensils for the dye, and the dye itself.
Step one: Melt the wax
Melt wax in a dipping vat, glass, or whatever you plan to use. I put my instant pot wire roasting rack in the bottom of my pot, placed the glasses full of wax on top of those, filled the pot carefully with water, and heated the water to a boil, then lowered the heat to a simmer when the wax melted.
Note: this took a really, really long time. If possible, you could sacrifice a larger jar to melt the wax first. You could also melt it in an old pot, but I wanted to use as few dishes as possible, and because I chose to use very dainty glasses, I was worried about them breaking, so I took the slow route.
Step two: Add the dye
Add your chosen color two drops at a time, and stir with a disposable utensil until you see the desired shade.
Note: There wasn’t much difference in color between the melted wax and the resulting candles, but this could be the dye I chose.
Step three: Tie hex nuts to the wicks
If you want to dip multiple candles at a time like Lisa at Farmhouse on Boone, follow her instructions for the wicks. She cut wicks 25” in length, and tied hex nuts at either end.
Step four: Dip the candles
Dip first in the wax, then dip the candle in the water. This cools the wax so you can dip in the wax right away.
Tip: before dipping the candle back in the wax, dry the candle with a towel. This prevents bumps created by water pockets trapped under the top layer of wax. I don’t think Lisa does this step, and her candles are really pretty anyway, but if you want really perfect candles, don’t skip this step.
When they have reached your desired diameter, allow the beeswax advent candles to cool completely.
You could stick them in the freezer, or put them in a jar of cold water, or just leave them on the counter.
Clean up the mess
Check out the tips section for easy cleanup!
After you have finished making your beeswax advent candles, what can you do with the leftover wax?
Here are two sources of ideas for what to do with the wax: here and here.
I won’t go into it, but these are my three favorites I can’t wait to try:
- If you didn’t add toxic dye to the wax, you could make beeswax wraps
- You can wax an apron or other cloth for waterproofing
- You can save the wax to seal logs that you have inoculated with mushroom spores for growing your own mushrooms
- If you have lard or tallow, you could add those to candles in the future
