Death Waxed Over - Tim Myers [80]
Play with different temperatures to get a varying amount of bubbles in the wax. For undersea candles, a popular choice for gel wax, we pour the wax as soon as it’s melted. That gives lots and lots of bubbles.
Sometimes we make small amounts of vivid wax combinations; pour the heated wax on a cookie sheet and let the different colors cool. The wax stays thin, around one-eighth inch. Then we cut out shapes from the wax and stick them to the insides of the glass. It provides a bright kaleidoscope of colors when clear gel wax is poured into the candle.
Themed candles are fun for holidays, birthdays and any special occasion. Craft stores have a variety of small objects that do well added to a gel wax pour. We’ve done themes with semiprecious stones, marbles, pretty gravel, colored sand and other items we already had on hand.
An assortment of coins buried into the gel wax make a good theme. Costume jewelry and anything that can stand the heat of the pour are good choices as well.
Handcrafted Candle Stands and Bases
Sometimes the way a candle is displayed is more important than the candle itself. Just about anything that will hold a candle upright can be crafted into a base. In the past, I’ve made candleholders out of papier-mâché, flower pots and even punched tin. I’ve found that recycled jars and bottles also make perfect candleholders.
Using a little creativity, you can customize your base to the occasion. For Halloween, decorate jars with ghosts, goblins and full moons after painting the glass black. To make a specialized holder for Christmas, a red or green base frosted with flocking makes a perfect centerpiece. Remember, though, that anything you put close to the candle’s wick needs to be fireproof!
I’ve also seen fruit carved out to hold candles at parties. The only limit is your own imagination, so have fun and experiment.
And now a peek at A Flicker Of Doubt, book 4 in the Candlemaking mysteries by Tim Myers.
A Flicker Of Doubt
By Tim Myers
Chapter 1
As my kayak brushed against the woman’s body, I thought I’d hit another half-submerged log. The Gunpowder River was full of all kinds of debris, washed there from the banks in the heavy rains that had assaulted us over the past two weeks. Paddling through the water was more like an obstacle course than the smooth river I usually found on my excursions.
It wasn’t until I looked closer that I realized what I’d brushed up against
In a moment of panic I dropped my double-bladed paddle, but I managed to catch it again before it skittered off the sleek surface of the boat and into the water. Without it, I’d be hopelessly adrift “Harrison, what’s wrong?” I looked over on shore and saw Markum, a big bear of a man with wild black hair and the look of an ogre about him, standing near the concrete steps that led down to the water in front of the complex. It was funny how he had become one of my best friends in the world. To the casual eye, we had nothing in common; no mutual interests to forge the friendship we had found nonetheless. Markum based his business at River’s Edge—my converted warehouse that featured retail shops downstairs and offices upstairs. My apartment was the only living space on the second floor, and it was perched above my candleshop, At Wick’s End.
My name is Harrison Black, and my Great-Aunt Belle had left me the entire place, including At Wick’s End, along with a hefty mortgage and a caveat not to sell the place for five years, not that I had any intention of ever parting with it. The people of River’s Edge had become family to me.
I could hardly bear to bring myself to look. “There’s a body floating in the water,” I shouted inanely. “She’s dead. What should I do?”
Markum considered it for a moment, then said, “I could call the sheriff, but it’s hard to tell how far the body will drift by the time he gets here. Do you have any rope with you?”
“Yes,” I admitted reluctantly, understanding instantly what he had in mind. I was a candlemaker by trade, so the worst things I had to deal with in my business were wax