Home Decoration with Wax Sculptures & Candles

Wax Casting for Home Interior Decoration

Hello there, I would like to introduce you to some wall art made from wax. This was a commision piece which was made to order. The client wanted a piece which would compliment there decor and life style and since I had free reign to design whatever I wanted I decided that I was going to do something which was to do with the human form. From the beginning of time artists have alway used the female form as an object of desirable beauty, so I thought it would be fitting and dramatic to make something which would hang on the wall as a decorative piece.
The piece is actually in proportion to a real human body and has been designed to be hung on the wall or placed in a corner setting.
The hanging can be used as a talking piece and feature and I have it on good athourity that the moulding has been very well recieved by the owner and company.
You can mould anything out of wax as long as the mould used is non-porous so the wax can contract evenly without cracking.
Anything can be placed inside the wax in order to give it an interesting visual effect. Try pouring some melted wax into a baking tray with leaves, beads, pebbles or anything which you think may look good in your finished piece. When the wax is set you can buy a table picture stand or push two screws into the wax while it is still soft and when set tie some string round it then you can hang it up on the wall.

How I Started Making Candles

One morning I was sitting on the edge of the sofa thinking "I'm really bored"! I had just finished college and was only working part time and as a creative person I found it difficult to keep still! So my thoughts turned to what can I do to amuse myself and the just like that, I said, "I'm gonna make candles today"!
So it was summer time and the hobby shop was still open then (sadly it is no longer with us), so I popped down the high street into Turtles hardware store and asked to be shown to the candle section.
I wasn't quite sure what I was doing but I thought if I buy a bag of paraffin wax, other additives, some wicks, colours, a few cheap moulds and get a book from the library, I’ll be good to go!

So I got home all excited and headed for the kitchen and got out some old pots, filled one up with a little bit of water then placed the smaller pot inside to create a wax boiler. This is the safe way to begin slowly melting paraffin wax while pawing through my candle making book!

As a rule, if you want good quality candles which are strong, long burning, vibrant in colour with a good scent throw, this is what you need to do.

1)      Everything has to be weighed. This is the only way to guarantee consistency and work out what additives you need to tweak. Follow this recipe and you can’t go wrong.

2)      You will need to measure the diameter of your candle in order to use the correct wick.

As a general rule with for a basic paraffin recipe, measure the radius of the mould and this will give you your correct wick size. If the candle mould has a 1” radius then you will require a 1” wick – it’s that simple.

3)      You’ll need paraffin wax, vybar, stearin and microcrystalline (if you can’t get it as it is not essential) Paraffin, Vybar, Stearin and Microcrystalline are all types of wax.

4)      You need between 10-15% of stearin to every 1kg of paraffin wax. Experiment with the 10-15% use what works for you (stearin - palm wax is used as a hardener).  For every 1kg of paraffin wax add 3% or 3-5 teaspoons of vybar (without this product it is nearly impossible to achieve flawless layers without bubbles and crack, your layers WILL NOT BOND PROPERLY if you don’t use this product – it also helps with scent throw and adds lustre and shine to the candles which means your candles will withstand more handling as appose to looking greasy.  Add about 2 tablespoons of microcrystalline wax if you can, this also adds strength to the candles.

5)      Once all your wax is melted  you can add some colour but personally I like to make lots of different colours at one time so I usually add a small amount of dye into the moulds just before pouring then mix it quickly with a kebab skewer.

6)      When using perfume you have to be really careful especially if you are use POLYCARBONATE moulds. The perfume deteriorates the plastic and you will never get smooth candles from that mould again and beware that you must protect your skin from such products as they are highly concentrated. Also pour your perfume into your wax at the last minute, this will guarantee maximum potency as due to the wax being heated overtime the strength of the perfume will become weak.

Now you’re good to go!

First I put down newspaper everywhere, work tops and floor, of course this minimises the chances of you ruining your kitchen and it must be noted that due to the concentration of the wax dyes one should wear glove if sensitive as the dyes will stain your hands for up to a few days (depending on how much washing up you do) and they will stain a form mica worktop!

Now we have to “wick up” which is means you have to boil out the wicks in wax until all the bubbles disappear. This will ensure that you don’t get any crackling and popping (rice crispy style) while burning your finished products. This usually takes about one minute. Once this is done you carefully lift them out of the wax and onto a non-porous surface and when cool enough you simply thread the wicks through your moulds and leave about an inch or two of overhang so that when you are ready to pull your candle from its mould you have something to hold onto, when the extra wick is too short in some instants it can prove difficult removing your candle from its mould.

So you have now wicked up, now all you have to do is plug up the hole the wick went through to prevent the wax leaking out once you have pour in your wax. I personally prefer to use wax which is beginning to cool down to plug the base then place into water until set, but mould seal is available.

You are now ready to pour in your wax (at the correct temperature).  You can now add some colour to your hot wax and pour carefully using a thick plastic pouring kitchen jug which will withstand the heat.

Once you have done this you will need to use either a cocktail stick or a wooden kebab skewer to centralise the wick. Most candle moulds have 2 halfway points round the top edge. This allows you to rest your sticks across the mould in a central position without fear of your wick moving.

If you want a multicoloured look you need to wait for each layer to semi set (approximately 20mins for each layer), so that when you pour your next layer the colours will not run, wait too long and the layers could retracted meaning than the hot pour wax will run down the small gap between the wax and the mould surface which doesn’t look nice, also waiting too long means that the last poured layer will not adhere to the one before causing it to separate – this also is not a good look L

So if you where making a 7 layer 10x2 inch candle, it would take you 2hours and 20 minutes to complete the colour pouring process.

During the setting process to speed things up you can place your candle in a water bath and weight the mould down with something heavy to prevent it from turning over, or you can place it in the fridge (this is my personal favourite and you can also place your mould in a water bottle then  in the fridge, it speeds up the setting process even more).

Now that you have left your candles to set, this is not the end!!! You now have to make sure you don’t get a “vortex” this is when the top exposed part of the candle sets and the wax contracts sucking in one side of the candle so you need to keep the exposed wax broken so that the candle can contract evenly.  

After about half an hour take the candle out of the water bath/fridge and with the wick held taut make circular motions in order to create a central cavity. This cavity should be filled up with hot wax and left to set ensuring at all times that the wick remains central. Repeat this method until the wax stops contracting from the middle.

If you have used a good quality recipe your candles should slide right out of their moulds once your mould seal has been removed.  To finish, get a shallow baking tray and heat up onto the stove (not too hot), and place your candles bottom end down onto the hot tray as straight as possible and move quickly around the tray in order to neaten the bottom so it will be smooth and stand up right!

Now you have beautiful candles!

Glow in the Dark Pebbles & Amazing Uses!!!

Watch Amazing Glow Pebbles Today!!

                                        Here We Glow                                             Watch  Glow in the Dark Pebbles Light Your Home/Garden!!

     Watch Amazing Glow in the Dark Pebbles This Minute!!

Watch Amazing Glow Pebbles Today!!

Here We Glow!
Watch Glow in the Dark Pebbles Light Up Your Home & Garden @ Night!!!

Watch Amazing Glow in the Dark Pebbles This Minute!!

Let me introduce you to the amazing solar glow in the dark Glow Pebbles! Illuminate and resonate your environment with these wonderful products.
Here are a few tips on what glow pebbles can be used for.
Product Information Fact: Did you know that Glow in the Dark Pebbles are enhancing products which engage creativity and help compliment environmental beauty?
"Glow Pebbles Increase Benefits for
Garden and Fish Pond/Tank Owners"
Truth be told, glow in the dark pebbles and stones are fantastic products to compliment and work alongside enhancing environmental beauty.
Want to know what's so great about them?
Glow pebbles are non toxic solar and artificially light charged poly resin which glow for up to 10-12hours, and are UV and black light reactive.

Being fashionable in appearance and figure well in whatever creative home plans you desire.
The infinite life cycle of the glow pebbles means that even if you have differing needs for your home, you will always own high quality products which have an infinite life span. Guaranteed safe around pets and enhances environmental beauty. We all know (or should know) how glow in the dark pebbles and cobble stones are amazing ice breakers at a home gathering (all they have to do is turn off the lights or wait till dark to show off your magnificent fish tank and/or garden display.
Interior Home Designers That's right, homeowners who love to create an ambiance or focal point around their ornaments, family photo's, children's ceilings, lamp holders, staircases, seasonal decorations, their computer screens, walkways, plant pots, flower vases, garden path and driveway, the list goes on!
As well as of course your traditional home gardener and fish tank owner Creative Horticulturists People love beauty and these glow pebbles are a wonderful way of creating a back and front garden area with our glow pebbles or cobble stones which is guaranteed to create that "WOW" factor.
Glow pebbles can be embedded into the garden wall, the shed door, footpaths, crazy paving and patios, around the engaging flowers and fish pond, only the imagination an stop generating ideas. For those of you who are more adventurous and really wish to create something a little more spectacular tarmac or cementing them into your driveway is a sure winner! They are so ideal for aquariums, plant pots, tubs and patio displays Art Students A lot of customers are arts and crafts amateurs or professionals and find many creative uses for them.
Guaranteed Lifetime Durability
We specialise in Glow in the Dark Pebbles and Cobble Stones which come in Blue, Aqua and Green - you will really be impressed by the level of glow from these pebbles.
Excellent for:
Fish Tanks
Aquariums
Garden Decoration
Plant Pots
Arts Crafts
Home Interior Decoration
Pathway Decoration
Porch Displays
Window Sill Decoration
UV and Black Light Reactive - so brilliant for fish tanks and interior decoration!!!!
Have a good look at the products - We know you WILL love them ;-)

How To Make Money On Ebay.com

Welcome young'uns! What you're about to read is how to research products that will sell on eBay without too much drama........Now, this advice won't make you millions but you will be able to make yourself a tidy bit of change which can help ease a financial burden enabling you to buy yourself some nice fluffy things without any guilt!
First of all how I started was a total fluke, I had an eBay account for years and never really used it. I had on a whim imported my first lot of glow pebbles for a personal project and after giving some away I had them in the house just sitting there doing nothing. I had never sold on eBay before and was slightly apprehensive at first but I thought I've got nothing to lose so I took a few pictures.
I had no real knowledge of eBay so I thought I'd better see who I'm competing with so I did an eBay search for glow pebbles and had a look at there ads and prices and calculated that I could sell my products slightly cheaper than theirs and still make a profit - so I decided to go for the Tesco mantra "Pile it high sell it cheap". The first time I listed my products sells where low then I realised I had made a silly error I needed to list my items under the same keywords as my competitors and list the item in there chosen category plus a few of my own to receive a cross selection of buyers.
The final thing I did before really getting into the sells was to let the buyer feel like they were getting something for nothing, so at the start I offered free postage and packaging! This worked like a treat and soon the pebbles were flying out the door so much so that some competitors stopped selling theirs and the others went back to selling what they did before and the rest I don't worry about!
Now that I started to get the bug for the whole thing and my items where selling fast I started to step up my game so I used Photobucket to create a slide show which showed all my items for sale and attracted more buyers and I didn't need to buy any tools or upgrade my account to do it! I have no experience at building website so found the cut and paste option brilliant, you simply "get code" and in your item description click on HTML and paste your slide show where ever you want.
When the listing was at its peak which was summertime (always a good time to sell) I had over 300 views on just one of my listing with a 10% sales conversion which isn't bad considering that was just one of my listed items.
So you chose a product, had a look on eBay to see if it will sell - plus google search it to see what comes up on the first page and you've cheekily managed to undercut slightly (even if it's only by 10p/10c) and you then used key words in eBay search to locate your product and if you've done this right and there isn't too much competition your items should come up on the first page. Use key words which will sell products - search hubpages for this subject.
A tip for working out what to sell is go for hobby items or items which people will need and have to come back for more like office stationary.
After a while I started getting hot on the maths and realised that by offering free postage and packaging eBay were actually getting more money out of me so I re adjusted my price so the total was the same but I now had an added postage price (eBay don't take money from postage in the final listing fee). You must remember eBay buyers are very funny when it comes to postage and packaging and don't seem to realise that items don't fly through their letterboxes in a plume of smoke, an envelope or suitable packaging teamed with postage usually encompasses their much awaited items, so at times if you see yourself getting low postage ratings don't worry about it as I will tell you how to keep you buyers happy and on your side when it comes to leaving feedback!
I'm gonna get a bit cheeky now and tell how to limit buyers from giving you low scores and the answer is you just tell them! After receiving a couple of emails telling me my account had been demoted in the searches I was a bit annoyed because the parameters on eBay are quite low so if you get 2% or more star ratings of I think 3 or below the emails start coming, but do not despair simply write on your listing what the postage and packaging pays for and this usually does the trick, also be bold ask them to give you 5 stars or no sell! When I did this not one person gave me a low score during following months of selling - go figure! Many buyers don't realise low star ratings can effect a sellers dashboard performance!!!. If buyers think you are being fair they will support you!
OOhhh I nearly forgot, eBay technically can't demote your listing especially if you have used the appropriate meta tags which will give your listings priority through Google because of its strong affiliation, if they really demoted your listing how would they make money out of you - it just wouldn't make sense!!
Always watch what your competitors are doing look at there items and what categories they are listed in, if they change category you do the same!!
Add extra key words in your "item specifics" section including your website and other vitals and promote like mad!
Look at the items which have multiple listings and look at the amount sold, this will give you a clear indication of what is popular. Also look at the date of items sold, if the listing says 79 sold but the last time someone bought one was 5 months ago, you know that's no good to you!
I have been selling as a hobby for less than a year and made over £3,000/$4,642 and have on average 50 rolling sales a month - not bad for a whim. I found a product I liked and know I have good judgement so if I like it others will to!!
Use bold writing with different colours to highlight your key points with good sizing and spacing with direct sales information and let them know your items are selling fast on other sites!!
Item that sell like mad are:
Christian Louboutin Shoes & other designer shoes
Designer Sunglasses/handbags/wallets/cufflinks/purses
Baking Items (silicone trays/cake tins/piping bags)
Office Supplies
Anti Virus Software
Personal Engraving Services
Name Brand Women's Underwear (especially D cup and above) New or Good condition
Car accessories (car mats/hubcaps)
Electronics Phones/headphones/computer equipment
Wholesale is the key, if you can buy a product and sell it for 100% profit or more after paying out all your fees including postage and packaging - you're on to a winner so relax, have fun and beat the competition!!!!
Now you know what to do get on with it and Good Luck!! ;-D

How To Make Money From Your Hobby!!

There are many creative people out there who are very talented but never really utilise it to there financial advantage. I used to be one of these people until one day I decided that I was going to have a go at making some money out of it.

My hobby of choice was candle making and it is something that I really got into and my creativity allowed me to produce bespoke luxury candles which were far different from what is already available. I must confess, I used to be a heavy shopper (I'm a reformed character now), and as such I was able to build a lot of relationships with different shops which later on was to work to my advantage.

Now, building relationships with different people is key in business as you never know when their range of set skills and connections will be able to help you, so if you have good interpersonal skills it is vital to use them to your advantage - remember about the six degrees of separation!!
So I warmed up perspective clients by telling them about my candle maker and introduced and seduced them with what I can do and let them know that my products where taylor made - this is the clincher as people are more than happy to have a product which they believe no one else will have, call it customer snobbery if you will! So I shopped around for my materials because I knew that if I was going to make a go of this I would have to be able to source my suppliers and find out if I could collect the items from my local or surround areas if I really needed to, and I love the Internet for this as it is a brilliant fact finding tool which can save you a heap of time & money!
Finding my suppliers was fairly straight forward and the next thing I needed to sort out was my packaging, and I have found at times that a lot of creative people make brilliant things then it's all let down by poor presentation. Looking in gift stores to see how products are presented is an easy way to overcome the struggle of how your product will sale as you don't want to come across as a "Please take mercy on me" type of a seller - it's embarrassing for a start and you need people talking about you and your products in a positive way so you can get repeat clients and new ones through word of mouth.
It is now at this point that I had it going on even though I didn't even know it. So I made a batch of candles, had them nicely scented and my packaging was looking really professional and one day I went into all the shops I used to frequent and showed them my work and had orders up to my eye balls!!! I had so many orders that people were willing to wait weeks for their products and it was then I realised the value of my work.
The first year I made candles, with the proceeds I managed to buy my custom built PC, printer, digital camera, mobile phone and a workshop shed - all the things I needed to really make a go of things and all from making and selling candles!!!
I remember the first Christmas I made candles I had orders totalling over £600 - not bad for a hobby ah?!?! I had business cards made up really nice ones too and I took a lot of pictures of my work and made an order contact sheet so I could show perspective clients.
I would hold candle parties in my front room which were really successful, having a laugh and a drink and making money, and anything I didn't sell I would take to craft markets or sell in bulk.
After a while in my local area I became sort of famous for making luxury bespoke candles and many times I would talk to people about them and show them pictures, and they would say "I've seen one of those at my friends house" so it became like a signature piece, once you've seen one K. Sinclair Candle if you see another one you know it was me who made it!! It's a nice feeling to know that you can stand out from the crowd and hold your own!

Throughout the time from when I started making candles I managed to hold my own art exhibition and gain sponsorship from some big high street names, my products were featured in the "Handle with Care" exhibition directed by the Design Museum, gift shops sold my products, my candles were featured on GMTV, I've had my products featured in the papers, I won a design competition sponsored by Topshop and the local borough council and have been invited to do motivational speaking and make promotional products for well known companies.
So you see, you too can make money out of your hobby and take it to the next level, all you need is a craft or hobby you know others will appreciate, good communication skills and the ability not to be put off by the word "No"!!
Take my advice, be brave and jump on it you never know if you don't try!!