Nodtveidt

Try doing a slightly different shade of dye, make it a little lighter. If your focal point is the ribbon, you want the ribbon to be darker so the eye is drawn to it. That's my suggestion. Excellent work though, they're beautiful.

Mod Podge sticks to just about everything...including a workbench if the bottle gets cracked... Great job, those look fantastic!

Sounds like the only dream that was created was the dream of them getting rich.

I make large triple-wick candles in heart-shaped bowls, generally very pale pink in color and scented with florals or chocolate. All sold out at the moment and never taken any pictures...guess I'll shoot off a few pics when I do the next batch next week.

Hrm...if I paid $65 for a candle that I could make myself for a tenth of the cost, my wife would make me eat the candle.:spit:

Shining Starr Wishes Upon A Starr Starrlight Grove (heh, this is a FO name, might be a problem) "Madison Starr" sounds great but reminds me of Madison Square Garden.

We tried ZenCart, osCommerce, Agora, PayPal's little system, and CubeCart. None suited our purposes. So, I just wrote my own. I know this isn't an option for most people but if you can get someone to write you a shopping cart that suits your needs specifically, it's the best way to go.

My wife and I named our little enterprise after our daughter. Of course, we do much more than candles, we do a whole line of gifts that goes beyond B&B, so it wouldn't have made sense to put anything candle-ish or B&B-ish in our name. Try something truly unique, but something memorable that will stick with people for a long time. If you sell more than candles, try using "Gifts" in your name (we did this), like blahblahgifts, or even blahblahbnb.

Sounds nasty. I'd probably have had a half a heart attack to see soy abused in such grotesque fashion. She needs to read this forum and learn how it's done!

For tealights, I use plastic cups and either "tealight" wicks or regular old 36-24-24C wicking, depending on the application. Platic cups just look so much better, metal ones tend to look cheap.

I've found that using a little vybar 103 eliminates wet spots when poured at the correct temperature. Ever since I started my vybar experiment, I've not had a single wet spot problem and only one slight frosting problem (was due to the FO I used).

Bluegrass never manages to keep a very good stock of FO, that's why I never order FO from them. Shame too, some of theirs are excellent...

Soy is definately a challenging wax. Stick with it though, the rewards are worth it.

Yeah, I agree, "Candle Nose" can really be counterproductive, especially when coming up with new blends. I can barely notice scents even after a 7 day cure. However, I gave a chocolate-scented candle to a friend of mine for St V's day (triple wick with only 3% load in soy wax), and she says it made her whole house smell like chocolate.

To wick a container like that, I first apply a glue dot to the tab, then straighten out the wick. From there, using the wick itself as a guide, I guide it into the jar and to its final resting place. Once the tab is loosely glued down, I use a couple of bamboo sticks to secure it in place.

It could be one or more of many variables, but it's most likely either the temp you add the FO at or one of the additives you're using. Try doing a dyeless candle and see if it helps.

NG is the company we're looking at right now for scents, as their shipping method is compatible with our location, unlike Peaks, who we were considering beforehand. Since we've moved to 100% soy-based candles for the time being (until we move into palm as well), I'm definately going to be interested in the scents that work best in soy. The "FO for Soy" thread will be very useful.

I used to buy a lot of stuff from Pourette until they started skimping out on orders. You have no idea whether or not an item is actually in stock when you order it from their website, and this is a major, MAJOR problem, especially when you've placed the same order three times and it doesn't come through any of the three times. I'll still order metal molds and dye chips from them, but for everything else, I have to look elsewhere to be sure I actually get what I order. Conclusion: For molds? They're tough to beat for metals, but avoid their plastics as they tend to be off-kilter...I've had to modify all the ones I bought from them just to get them to align properly. For dye chips? Very inexpensive and I've never had order problems with that. For everything else? Look elsewhere, there are much better suppliers out there.

Well, I'm not a lady but I use 5 tbsp pp of stearic with SB1C wicking from Pourette. It's never let me down.

Hrm...never used wick pins in votives, always used a mold and wicking rod. I guess whatever works for you... Candlemaking is only dangerous if you're absent-minded. As for dyes...I personally prefer the chips, but the liquid dyes do serve some purposes, such as streaked pillars...can't do that with chips, or at least not nearly as easily.

It's not too far removed from what some commercial candlemakers do anyways, which is to only apply FO to the top of the candle to shave off a few extra bucks. They know that you're going to smell the candle, and if the top smells, you're going to assume that the whole candle will smell like that...you're getting cheated. Of course, some people say that the scent will somehow magically flow through the rest of the candle this way...I'd like to know HOW...

I picked up a sampler of Orange Sherbert from Pourette awhile ago and was completely blown away by how GOOD it smells! However, when I used it in paraffin, it had a very strange smell to it, can't quite place what it was though. Crazy thing was, I was so floored by the scent that I ordered a 16oz bottle before ever even doing a test burn! Well fortunately, I found that the oil works very well in my soy mix, so it wasn't a loss at all. So I guess for this scent, I stick to my soy mix and skip the pillars. It really is a yummy scent though, any time my nose gets anywhere near it, I get hungry!

The name.

Rustics are great and that looks fantastic. Good job!

Ah, I love vanilla! And those look great!