Christmas Crafting – Candles

After reading about them in Real Simple and Bonzai Aphrodite, Brian and I decided that we would make candles for his grandmothers.  Our plan was to take Real Simple’s advice and find interesting containers for the candles and then follow Sayward’s easy peasy instructions to actually make them.

We went to our local antique store to find containers and ended up with a silver cup with a beautiful etching on the side and a small silver cream pitcher.  Then we stopped by our local Michael’s to buy the candle pieces (wax, essential oil, and wicks).

We were unable to find an amount of wax or essential oil that would work for us.  You can only buy A LOT and we didn’t know how this was going to turn out… if we ended up being candle-making losers, we didn’t want to be stuck with a lifetime supply of stuff to make candles.  So, we went semi-homemade and bought white candles that had a scent we liked (i.e. not vanilla, which is harder to find than you may think!).  We’d just shave pieces of wax off and put them in the containers like we would with official candle-making wax.

Once we had our containers filled with yet-to-be-melted max, we put them in our slowcooker, just like Sayward told us to.  Glitch number 2: we couldn’t put the lid on because the little pitcher was too tall.  Hmm.  Well, the next best thing would have to be a big pot with a lid, right?  We guessed so.  So, we put them in a big pot and covered ‘em up – in just a little while, voila!, melted wax.

We had to keep adding hard wax to fill up our containers, but in the end we got what we were supposed to.  We added the wicks and let them harden.

Cute, right?  We thought so.  Now we may actually go buy wax and essential oil (perhaps dye, too!) to really make candles from scratch.

Christmas Crafting – Mulling Spices

The final homemade gift we gave went to my parents, who went on a tour of the NC wine country with us last fall and loved the mulled wine we were served at one of the vineyards.  My only regret with these little guys was that I didn’t make one for Brian and I!  They smelled SO good.

I was able to find bulk spices at my local Healthy Home Market along with a few clementines and some cheese cloth.

Allspice, Clove, Star Anise, Cinnamon, Orange Zest

I basically just assembled them and tied them off with baker’s twine (an obsession leftover from my wedding).  How cute are they?!

Finished Mulling Spice Packets

Christmas Crafts – Sweet Treats

Brian and I ended up making three of the gifts (well five, technically, but three are in the same “category” so I’m grouping them together… this will make more sense soon) I featured in my Crafty Christmas series pre-Christmas.  I was very excited to try a few handmade gifts and now I’ve totally caught the bug and can’t wait to try more adventurous handmade items.

The biggest undertaking was the sweet treats I made, mostly because I (for some unknown reason) decided to make them all in one morning.  Not the best plan as far as maintaining one’s sanity goes, but thankfully they all turned out very well (if I do say so myself!).

The first of the three treats, and the most challenging, was salted chocolate caramel from Smitten Kitchen.

Cooling Caramel

As far as I’m concerned, she is a total genius and I knew I could trust her recipe (which was important since I was giving these to my *new* relatives and I didn’t want them to gag).  And, oh man, she didn’t disappoint.  These were so amazingly rich, I still can’t believe I made them!

Heating the caramel to 255 degrees

I decided to individually wrap them in wax paper, which was easier than I thought it would be and, with all the traveling, kept the caramels looking good (and not all stuck together).

Chopping and wrapping the caramels

I followed her recipe pretty much to a tee, so I’m not going to do deprive you of her wit and humor by summarizing it here.  Just go check it out on Smitten Kitchen – trust me, you won’t be disappointed.

The other two treats I made were Oreo and Nutterbutter balls, a recipe I found at Bakerella, another baking master.  Initially I was only going to make one treat to bring with me to Brian’s family Kentucky, but these were just too easy and too tasty sounding to not do.  Plus Carlos kept telling me about how amazing they were…

Dipping the Oreo Balls

There are only really four steps to this recipe: first crush the cookies, then mix in cream cheese and make into 1″ balls, dip the balls in chocolate, cool and eat!  Boy oh boy are they scrumptious…

Crushing cookies in the food processor

Requisite picture of Chambers helping

Putting the finishing touches on the Mint Oreo balls

A few notes on the cookie balls (I’m just not crazy about this name – anyone have any cuter suggestions?):

1. I found that softening the cream cheese in the microwave for 10-15 seconds helped a lot with the mixing process and didn’t alter the consistency.
2. I dipped the Oreo balls in white chocolate and the Nutter Butter balls in milk chocolate.
3. I don’t have a double boiler to melt the chocolate for dipping, but a glass bowl over a pot of slowly boiling water worked just fine.
4. I added about six drops of mint extract to part of the Oreo mix and it was like Thin Mint heaven.  I also added green globs to the top of the mint Oreo balls to distinguish them – I need some tips on using a decorating tool.

What do you think? Have you made anything like these before?  Any tips out there for me?