2014 - Happy New Year

Starting with the new year I've decided to dedicate single postings to individual candles.  I know it's going to make for more posts but they'll be much shorter and I can share more of the pictures I take of the candles.  So.... on to 2014's candles!  Happy New Year!!

Happy Holidays

December was decidedly MUCH busier in the candle burning area than the summer or autumn was.  It must be because the winter is too cold for me to go outside and do anything.  Here's the first candles I burned, a pair of beeswax candles.  They must have been sheets of beeswax that were wound around the wick, that's how it looked like they were made anyway.

They didn't last very long so I moved on to another small candle - a sparkly pine tree.

This one didn't last long either.  I guess burning the small candles plays a big part in why I ended up burning so many this month.  Here's the next one - a sparkly church.

A small church candle.  The interesting thing about this one is that it isn't solid all the way through. 

As you can see, it's hollow in the bottom.  I don't know why they made it that way but there's my hand "wearing" the church, so you can see just how hollow and small it is.  Needless to say, this one burned up pretty quickly, just like the rest.

Up next were two little fish candles.  They probably would have made cute birthday cake candles.  That is, if I hadn't gotten to them first...

 

They didn't last long either so I mooooved (ha-ha) on to this adorable one eyed purple cow.

I never understood why candle-makers put the wick in the head only.  I get that it's the biggest part of the candle, but the backside of candles never ends up melting when they're built that way.  I digress...  

Up next is an adorable little mouse candle.

It's like it's almost begging me not to set its head on fire.  Too bad I don't listen to inanimate objects!  

Continuing the tiny candle tradition, I set this Native American bear candle aflame next.  Isn't she cute? 

Yeah, she didn't last long either...

From here I moved into my Christmas/Autumn/Winter phase.  And I have to ask, is it sacrilegious to burn candles bearing Jesus on the cross?  Because that's the first candle I burned when I moved into this phase...

 

Should I be worried that I'm going to hell now?  Let's hope Jesus understands that I didn't mean anything by burning this candle, because I didn't.  It's just a candle after all.  Anyway, as you can see this candle is pretty flat and has wicks on both ends, which means that if you light both ends at the same time, it's REALLY gonna burn - and it did!

Moving back to lighter fare, I decided it was time to burn some taper candles I'd collected. 

Mr. Snowman

Autumn themed

Christmas Tree

Merry Christmas

Santa & Presents

Taper candles burn pretty quickly, those took all of 3 days to melt down.  Next it was on to this cute Jack-in-the-box.  I loved the way the colors of the candle mixed when it melted down.

 

Next was this little beauty.

She's so cute with her little lamb, I almost felt guilty lighting her wick.  Almost...  And in keeping with the holiday and winter theme, another snowman met his end by my lighter.

As did the three wise men...

If I wasn't going to hell before, I am now... Right???

I'm gonna guess that this Santa wasn't feeling any joy when the flame got down to his part of this candle...  I love that the candle-makers included his little backside sticking out of the back of the word.  Too funny!

At this point, I've decided I don't enjoy the frigid temperatures of winter, or the snow on the ground.  I need some spring (which I know isn't coming for quite some time...), so I picked these candles next.

 

The house may not say "spring" to you but I think the cheery colors (even if they are chipping off) do.  I did not volunteer for anything that caused me to receive the flower candle, I simply found it at Salvation Army, but it definitely screams "spring"!  Even this cute Noah's Ark candle suggests that spring is around somewhere...

It came in that little plastic box that has a cardboard scene of ocean and sky.  I guess you're supposed to get the idea that the ark is still afloat in the water at this point - notice the waves at the base of the ark.  They must be about to find land because the sky is all bright and sunny-like.  Needless to say, this tiny candle didn't last long.

I returned to the upcoming holiday and a semi-religious candle.  It's less offensive than the crucifixion or three (albeit cartoon) wise men candles but it does have the bible on it, so it's still religious in my book. 

I think it may be depicting advent, even though there's a candle missing and they're not the right colors.  If it isn't advent, I don't know what it's supposed to represent.  I can say that I'm pretty sure it's an older candle.  I don't see candles made like this anymore and the ones I have found that are similar are from the 1970s. 

Next, I chose this snowman-like candle.  I don't think it can be called a true snowman candle because it's just a head attached to a purple ball.  It doesn't even have arms...but it is cute.

For the next candle I went with this one:

It's not really holiday-ish, other than in color.  It really strikes me as an odd candle, the longer I look at it.  Why don't the people have faces?  What are the colors supposed to represent?  Clothing?  I'm at a loss.  It doesn't matter, anyway, because it melted down pretty quickly once I lit both wicks.

I sure have a lot of snowman/snowmen candles...  I liked this one because one of the men is wearing a shirt that reminded me of the University of Michigan - although the colors are wrong.  This one met its demise the day after Christmas.

 

After burning so many small candles at the beginning of the month, I decided it was time to pick a large candle for the end of the month.  Here it is:

The front of the house

The back right side of the house

The back left side of the house

This one was pretty light for a large candle.  I've come to the conclusion that large lightweight candles are filled with a lot of air in the wax, it makes them melt a lot faster than an identical one that is denser/heavier.  This candle flamed out in two days!  Yeah, TWO days!  I expected longer too.

I went back to a Christmas candle next.  This little snowman who's wishing you a Merry Christmas and making a snow pun at the same time.  Clever...

Later that same day, once the snowman melted, I found this candle that's also making a pun about a bun in the oven.  It must have been from a baby shower.

 

I have to say, this is a pretty clever and unusual baby shower gift.  I assume that there were a bunch of these and they were given to the guests to thank them for coming to the shower.  Although, it could have been a gift for the mom-to-be as well.  I'll never know...

I went back to needing some springtime with the next candle.  I can't wait to hear the frogs croaking in the water that runs next to my house when the spring does eventually come.

New Year's Eve finally rolled around and I felt it was time to relive the dawn of the new millennium all over again with this bear candle.

 

Happy 1999 or 2000 (I suppose the candle could have been used for either year) everyone!  But, it was such a small candle that it didn't last long and I moved on to this Asian bear.

 

I can't read whatever writing that is so it could be another New Year's candle, or it could be saying that China (or Japan or some other country that uses characters like the ones on this bear's back) is the greatest country in the world, who knows?  It was also a very small candle so it melted down rather quickly and forced me to revisit Christmas candles.

I don't think this Santa is gonna fit down any chimneys any time soon!

Once that one melted down I picked this star-shaped Santa to melt.  Check out how skinny this guy is!

 

That concludes December and 2013!  Happy New Year!

November

November must have been a busy month for me because I only burned two candles the whole month!  I'm not sure why the happy face candle has a handle, it's not like you could carry it around while it was lit and use it like a lantern.  I thought it was clever that that cake candle's wick was the cherry stem.  On to December...

Mmmm...cake!  As Homer Simpson would say.

A happy face candle with a handle.  :)

October - home of my favorite holiday - Halloween

Behold!  A Halloween gel candle!  Did I mention that I LOVE Halloween?  I do.  And this candle is pretty cool too!  It's also pretty eclectic in its trinkets.  A skull, a little witch guy, and something else, I'm not sure what it was (October was like 4 1/2 months ago).  The witch and the mystery guy kinda go together but the skull is totally out of place in this candle.  Maybe this was some kind of homemade candle?  Who knows...

Sticking with the Halloween theme I next chose this witch's hat candle.  It came in a clear plastic box and was marked at a whopping $6.99 from Borders Books.  Who in their right mind would spend THAT MUCH on that tiny candle?  It's not lined with gold!  I know, I burned it down!  Glad I found it at a thrift store for super cheap!
The next candle is so amazingly awesome it really does require a bunch of (but not all of) the 22 pictures that I took of it to be posted.  I have yet to find another candle to match its awesomeness.  I just couldn't wait to burn this one when I found it.  Who gives these things away to thrift stores???  And why???

It's a zombie hand candle!  You can light ALL of the fingers!

The back of the zombie hand!  Yes, the
fingernails are painted purple!

Without the flash you can really see the veins in the hand!

A couple of the fingers were broken.  This
one appears to have a "bone" in it...

Burning the hand makes it "bleed".

Burning also makes the "bones" come out!

This reminds me of Freddy Krueger.

The "bones" from the front of the hand

The "bones" from the back of the hand.

Once Zombie Krueger's hand was sufficiently melted down (and had set off the smoke detectors more than twice) it was time to move on to a less sooty candle.
Little Frankie Stein was the perfect choice.  He came wrapped in plastic and in his own coffin.

Isn't he adorable?!

He wasn't going to last very long because he only had one wick and it was situated in the middle of his abdomen.  Also, because he was a fairly small candle.  I decided that he needed a partner.  The Scaredy Cat was it!

Don't be afraid, little kitty!

They burned brightly together nicely.

Continuing with the Halloween theme the next candle I found was this one:

The embodiment of Halloween, in my opinion.

Here's the other side of the candle.
It's been waiting a while to be burned...
see all the dust?

Here's the aftermath of setting this one on fire...

If you look closely you can see that the outer
walls of the house started to melt down on
every side.  So much for Halloween!

Even though Halloween was a day away I decided to pick a non-Halloween candle to burn next.

Shiny red and twisty.
Time to test out the new candle holder...

It didn't burn like I expected it to.  But I do like
the way those spires were created.

After awhile the spires couldn't support their own weight.

After the pretty red candle I gave in and went back to Halloween.  :)

The ghost doesn't look too sure about this...

Our final candle for the month is...

A hand shaped candle formed in a cookie
cutter.  Talk about unusual.

A Cookie Candle

I have never seen, before or since, a candle molded into a cookie cutter before.  I thought it was very nicely packaged and it smelled really nice while it burned.  If you're wondering if I kept the cookie cutter once I was done burning the candle, I did not. I don't make cookies very often so keeping a cookie cutter was basically pointless.  On to November...