This weekend, my friend J and I decided to get crafty and make some candles…or rather J resolved herself to trying to teach the most uncoordinated, creatively-challenged person in the world the fine art of candle making.

Did I mention I’ve already burned one house down? Well, technically I didn’t, bad dryer wiring did, but it still makes me a little gun-shy on all things flammable.

So, for two days, J helped me get the basics of candle-making, which was no small feat considering that I still managed to have a wax accident that we dubbed either the wax-apocalypse, or waxopalypse, depending on how many drinks we had in us at the time. Regardless of the name, my sweet husband bit his tongue and helped me clean the carnage up, because he is a saint like that.

In our crafting adventure, we experimented with a few techniques (all with an eye toward Halloween). Here are the results:

First, and the least hard to screw up, were the jar candles. This first set turned out really well, and smells like fall-in-a-jar. These have definite potential as favors for our big Halloween party:

We then attempted some black pillar candles for my spooky candelabras. We made various sizes, and I was really excited about these because they also smell just right, not like some licorice nastiness I find in the stores:

Finally, we saw a project in a craft book that looked too easy or crazy to pass up. It involved dipping fabric in wax and covering a candle. This was the result:

So, overall, my first foray into candle-making was pretty darn fun, and pretty darn successful, all things considered.

And my house is still standing.