JAVAEBOY

Jennifer, I don't have a good answer to your question immediately, but the answer really depends on what kind of battery powered tea-lights you are talking about, flickering, steady light, etc. Most if not all of the "cheap" ones don't give off much light, unless you are in a very dark room. Those I have seen as cheap as 2 or 3 for a $1 at the dollar store. I have had a little better luck with some I found at "The Christmas Tree Shoppe" where they were 6/$2.99. I haven't seen those in awhile though. I have also tried the LED Submersible Floralytes. Those are very bright, they don't flicker and are available in 9 different colors and even a color changing version starting at about $1.69/each. They work great if you are looking for a lot of light but they don't really give off that realistic look due to the fact that they don't flicker. I would go to Ebay to see all the different kinds (I even saw some similar to the Christmas Tree Shoppe ones I mentioned. Type LED tea lights in the search bar and all kinds will come up. I had been getting those Floralytes from a company called COD Wholesalers. The nice thing about the Floralytes is that they are also water submersible, they are really designed for floral water displays, but that is part of the reason, they are so much more expensive. HTH. SteveG.

Thank you for the explanation Vicky. I would definitely go with the tea light also. If those are the same round globes I buy (or used to buy) at Dollar tree, you can make it kind of like a double glassed gel candle (with or without the gel) you can even insert a votive glass inside with some clear silicone adhesive. That is how I attach my votive glasses in mine. Those and a clear tea light holder, and you should be all set. Will the clay handle the heat of pouring the gel? If so, that would also look nice.

Vicky, That looks great. I've never heard of a rose "cane". Exactly what is it, if you don't mind me asking? JavaEboy.

I checked around and this extender appears that it would work. As an IT professional I can say, I'm not someone who would ever buy an iPhone because I think their new stuff is 2 years behind the Samsung Android stuff... (Sorry I had to throw that in.) Try this item on Amazon. It gets mixed reviews for a number of reasons other than what you want it for, mostly because it is plastic. The most favorable review states this: Great extension for Square reader in an Otterbox - Purchased to use my Square credit card reader on my Galaxy S4 without having to peel the Otterbox off of it every time. This extension fits great and works perfectly. Take into account that the user is using it with an Android phone, but it is in an Otterbox case and the user is using a Square reader. I can't attest it will work, but for < $5.00 it's worth a shot. http://www.amazon.com/Exclusives%C2%AE-Headphone-Adapter-Samsung-Tablets/dp/B00I1IYMN4/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1411585293&sr=8-3&keywords=headphone+jack+extender

Ida, If you check your messages, you will see I gave you step by step instructions (Not in Word) to create that custom template in DesignPro. I would need your email to send you Word 2010 directions. I don't think you will need them though. I put my email address in the private message to you if you want to respond to it.

That is the one. Before I go through the time trying to create a document for you to follow on creating a custom template, do you have Microsoft Office? If so, which version?

Ida, Avery also offers templates that can be downloaded into Word for those exact labels. If you dig deep enough into DesignPro, it does give you the ability to create "custom" templates. In this case, if you already have the 22808 labels at your disposal, you can "create" a new template that mimics the layout of those labels. Given about 30 minutes or so, I am sure I could create one. The only problem is that there would be no way to get it to you. If I get the chance I'll try to find time in the next few days to provide you with a step by step guide to creating a "custom" template in DesignPro for those labels. TallTayl, Being an IT professional for over 30 years, I can tell you that even with DesignPro, I still have the ability to use other programs in conjunction with it. I guess it all depends on what you have at your disposal and how much work you want to do. I am able to use Photoshop, CorelDraw, MS Access and many others to enhance the more basic tools available in DesignPro. I think for most people, DesignPro, gives them the tools they need.

Ida, I use the Avery software itself. The one I have is called Designpro. You can download software right form the Avery website. Go to Avery.com Hover over Help Choose Avery Software Help Choose Design and Print Download the PC or MAC version You do have to fill out a form, but I believe that is the same software I have. Here is the tricky part. For some reason, Avery doesn't list all their various Items in the software. What you can do though is find another Avery product with the same dimensions. In your case, the Avery 5294 is a 2 1/2" diameter label. It just happens to be white. Hope the helps.

eitsfan, If I understand your last question a little differently from the way Vicky is taking it, yes you can use a tea light in the inner container, NOT as the inner container. All of my gel candles are double glassed, actually I sell them as Candle Holders. I use a votive glass as my inner container and use a tea light in a clear acrylic holder as my lighting source. I don't think the outer gel ever gets warm enough for any scent to be released though, at least not since the tea light in the votive glass is so deep in the candle holder itself. I recommend that the buyer use scented tea lights. This helps both the buyer and you the seller somewhat. Since 95% of my business is at craft shows, I don't have to carry different scented candle holders, the buyer can purchase their choice of scented tea lights. Granted there are not nearly the selection of scents available in tea lights that we as candle makers have at our disposal, but usually the customers can find something that they like. I have even sold my candle holders for use at outdoor parties and weddings, where the buyer used citronella tea lights to keep the bugs away. Although Vicky's recommendation to weigh down the votive glass in her directions for Candle #2 will work, Since all of my Candle Holders use a votive glass on the bottom of my outer container, I use a more permanent solution. I use Clear Silicone Adhesive to "glue" my votive to the bottom of my outer container. Even though it says Clear on the tube, it isn't totally transparent. It has a frosted glass like transparency. This is the same adhesive that Aquarium shops use to build Acrylic fish tanks. It has a 24 hour curing time (just out in the open, no oven curing needed) and has a temperature threshold of 400 degrees, so it won't come unhinged if you put your gel candle creation in the oven to remove the bubbles, like I do. This is available at your local Lowes, Home Depot or even Walmart for about $5 for a 9 or 10 oz tube for use in a caulk gun. They usually have smaller tubes available in the Lowes and Home Depot stores, but these caulk size tubes are the best value. Hope that helps.

Thank you all for your replies. ktaggard, I agree with your assessment of the IRS

Vicky, I won't have a problem getting a receipt, since the Charity was sponsored by a family member. In that case, I am guessing you are saying the receipt should be for the value of the items as though I had sold them to customers?

I tried to search for this here and online and didn't find what I thought was an apples to apples comparison. I have donated a number of my candle holder centerpieces for use at a Dog Rescue Charity event. My question is when I do my taxes next year, do I get to subtract only "my" cost of producing them, or the cost at which I would have sold them at one of my shows? To clarify the situation, in my case, these centerpieces were made specifically for the Charitable event, since the hostess chose the specific colors for the glass and surrounds in the double glass candle holders I made. I found an article on-line that I thought may have the answer, but it was talking about someone who sells the craft, in this case a vase, that they brought into their inventory for sale, they bought the vase for $50, and would have sold for $200. The shop owner in this case would only be able to deduct the $50 she paid for the vase from the maker of the vase, not the $200 she would have gotten if it had sold. I figured with all the knowledge and experience here, someone must have had the same or similar scenario. Thank you in advance.

I agree with Vicky. The big credit card companies can kill you with their monthly charges. It all depends on the amount of transactions you are going to do, and whether you are going to be processing credit cards in person or over the phone/internet. There is a difference in charge % with both Square and Intuit GoPayment, that has to do with whether you have the credit card in hand or are manually entering the information. I use both Square and Intuit GoPayment for Credit Cards. For me, the Intuit GoPayment credit Card scanner works better than the Square reader, but I believe there is a new Square reader since I got mine, so it may be just as good if not better. Hope that helps.

QTsmum, $8 would be the minimum I would charge, based on your cost. I believe most people would recommend 2.5 - 3 times your cost. Now for the critique... This is ONLY my opinion. Besides it being sideways , I think you need to do something about your label. I would cut it down in height since it is hitting the curvature of the jar at the top and bottom of the label. It looks to be bunching up, and not giving a professional look, at least to me. That may require you to either buy smaller labels or to have to cut each set manually after they are printed. I'm guessing those are 2" x 4" labels. I would try perhaps 1 1/2" x 4" (Avery 5197) or something similar. This is a cross reference chart from a place called Sheet-Labels.com http://www.sheet-labels.com/labels/avery_cross_reference_list They have their own labels, but it is nice that they also list the Avery Label Numbers. Maybe you can look up something on there that would get you a better fit. Hope that helps.

QTsmum, It is actually very easy to track everything in Excel, if you or your husband are fairly proficient in using it. I believe if you do a search in this forum, you will find at least a few Excel spreadsheets that members have been kind enough to share. None of the ones on here actually fit my need, so I wrote my own. I make double glassed gel type candles that are very similar in design, (outer glass vessel, inner votive glass, gel, embeds, etc.) I merely took very careful measurements on each of the elements of my candle designs, and put the cost figures in my spreadsheet. As costs per element change, a simple change in the spreadsheet, resets my cost basis. I have written a Sample Spreadsheet for you to examine. ONLY the actual Cost of the bulk items is correct (via Caldlewic.com) I made guesses at the shipping costs, and other things like the number of Wick Tabs in a 1lb bag. I gave a few sample examples, assuming a 9oz candle holder would need 9 oz of wax and 6 inches of wick and a wick tab. I couldn't put the Excel file in here since I couldn't find a way to attach it. (Only the screenshot) If you want it for reference, drop me an internal note with your email address, and I'll send you a copy.

There is another option, which I believe emilyspoppy was eluding to. With a power inverter, you can run an AC cash register from a car battery or even a jump charger. The battery doesn't need to be in a car, it can be a spare one you have access to. Since the cash register really doesn't need much power, a fairly low power inverter would suffice. Here is one from Harbor Freight that you can attach to a spare car battery. http://www.harborfreight.com/400-watt-continuous-800-watt-peak-power-inverter-66814.html This is another option. This is an inverter that plugs into what used to be called a cigarette lighter: http://www.sears.com/peak-150-watt-power-cup-inverter/p-02876411000P?prdNo=11&blockNo=11&blockType=G11 The item directly above with the use of a car jump starter with a 12V port like the one in the next link, would work also: http://www.harborfreight.com/12-volt-jump-start-and-power-supply-38391.html What you can't see in the pictures of the last item, is that it has a 12V power port to plug the Inverter into. I used something like the first and third link to power a very powerful fan for my booth last summer. If you have a jump starter similar to the one in my third link, you merely would need an inverter to plug your existing cash register into. You can be all set for $30 - $50 depending on what you already have on hand.

Samstoy, Bubbles are kind of the evil and beauty of gel. This is a little hard to explain in words, but, depending on the size of the opening, you can try pouring the gel from your whatever you are using to pour from, with the use of a spoon to slow down the actual droppping of the gel into your candle itself. I melt my gel in a your general Presto pot, transfer it to a smaller glass beaker with a spout, I let it sit for a 20 seconds or so, (this lets the bubbles from the agressive pour, work themselves out) and pour into my candles with something like a tablespoon as a barrier to slow down my pour a little. I hope you can imagine that. That is what I did when I was actually making traditional gel candles. Now, all my candle holders (I really don't do true candles, per se, mine are all double glass now) I pour, put them back into a 225 degree oven to have any of the bubbles still in there, work themselves out. Since I only do a dozen at a time, I leave them in the oven for 30 minnutes or so, then turn off the oven and leave them in there to cool. This method won't work if your imbed is suspended with out the use of something to hold it up. I don't suspend anything in my double glass candle holders, everything is put into the bottom or to fill the space and the gel is poured over the embeds. You can still see a few bubbles in this one, but that is a very old picture, before I improved my technic. I still get some bubbles, but not nearly as bad as I used to. I hope that helps.

Chris, That is one way, the other is to find someone with a machinist caliper or micrometer. Do a Google search and you'll see what tools I am talking about. Measure the szie of your wick with one of them. The packages of jewelry crimps you are talking about, should have a hole size listed on the package. Compare that to the wick size (The hole obviously needs to be slightly larger) and you should be all set once you use a crimping tools which also can be bought at Micheals or wherever you buy your craft stuff.

cqui, I think I figured it out awhile back that the items needed to make your own gel wax, don't end up being much cheaper than buying it when it is either on sale or when you can use various coupons (Michaels, ACMoore, Hobby Lobby) and such. By the time you buy the correct oil, and the find and get shipped the needed additional chemicals to make it, I think the money saved, will not make up for the time spent making it. Just my 2 cents. Unless prices have changed dramatically that is.

Again, I think it all depends on how much business/income you are going to be making from your candle business. If it is less than $5000 in income, you shouldn't need anything more than the personal package. I was actually able to do all my taxes online for free this past year, since my combined net income was under a the amount needed to file like that. I have been trying to take advantage of putting as much money into my 410k and IRA's to prepare for retirement.

I look at taxes as 2 separate entities. You have your sales tax and your income tax. In New York where I live, when I first applied for my Tax Exempt certificate, I had to pay my sales taxes quarterly. Since this is only a hobby, and I don't really sell enough, or collect enough sales taxes to file so frequently, NY last year, sent me a letter telling me I only had to file my sales tax receipts once a year. As for my Income taxes, depending on the amount of your actual income from your sales, you can generally file your income from your sales right along with your individual taxes. I'm fairly sure, it would work the same if filing jointly. If I remember correctly, there is a max amount of income from sales you can claim (I believe the amount was $5000) without having to get into more extensive forms, but even at that, I am sure something like TurboTax would be able to handle those forms for you. Disclaimer: Your mileage may vary, and it never hurts to talk to a tax professional. Hope that helps. SteveG.

Russell, I can't really answer what your next step should be. I also come from an IT background, and only do this as a hobby, and make a non-substantial amount of money from doing a few shows a year. I have never worked with palm wax, so I can't help there either. What I can help out with a little is the grammatical wording on your website, although I really hated grammar classes in High school and College. (In the 30+ years I have been out of school, no-one has ever asked me to identify the adverb in a sentence.) On your page describing your "Brisk and Bake Pour Process", in the second paragraph, you wrote: "Have you ever try a candle that smells great..." That sentence should read "Have you ever tried a candle that smells great..." Just me offering a little bit of help there. Good luck in whatever your do, and remember that grammar checkers on computers are your friends. SteveG

Sndfrddy, According to the Square website, it does appear that you can use just WiFi to process Credit Cards. https://help.squareup.com/customer/portal/articles/157685-can-i-take-payments-offline- I would call to make sure. The only problem with using a WiFi only device, is that you would obviously only be able to use it where WiFi is available. That might be a problem if you were to have a craft show in a building or outside in a place without public WiFi access. Just a thought. As for which tablets and such you can use, there is a link on the squareup website that lists the devices. It does state that Android Honeycomb (android 3.X) is not yet supported. I'm an Android guy, I don't have a tablet, but I would think that your best bet for a tablet, if you want ALL the functionality would be an apple iPad, since they have a special app that works on the iPad for doing "Item Library" (I don't know what that is) and Cash Drawer and Receipt printer integration. Hope that helps.

As for the silicone to hold the wicks, that is an excellent idea. You can get the silicone adhesive in either small squeeze tubes or in the 10 oz tubes that fit into caulking guns. The tubes will say clear, and it does stay "fairly" clear, but it does have a little bit of a cloudy look to it. You can find it at Lowes, Harbor Freight, Graingers, Home Depot and even Walmart sometimes has it. Do a search for Silicone, on the Lowes website, and one of the ones that comes up is GE 9.8 Oz. Clear Silicone, it is $4.97 in my store. It really goes a long way. You also may find it listed as silicone for Aquariums. If you buy it at the pet store, it will definitely be more expensive, but you need so little, it doesn't make that much of a difference. Once cured (24 hours), it will handle 400 - 450 degrees, so you shouldn't have any problems in the oven. I use it in my double glass candles, just don't use too much, I have had a few occasions when it reacted a little with the LD gel when in an oven at 250 degrees or more (I know that isn't always a safe temperature to put gel in an oven, but I tried to rush getting the bubbles out of a few candles once and found this out.) The adhesive stuck fine, I just got a little cloudiness near the adhesive. Hope that helps.

CandleRon, I use their gel a lot. I don't really do embeds the way most people use them, I actually use the gel as a way to hold the crystals and glass pieces I use in my double glass candles, more or less just to hold everything in place. I'm a novice at this stuff, but I would guess that you can still use the LP consistency if you plan your execution correctly. By that I mean if you were going to suspend a few marbles 1" from the bottom, you could pour 1" of gel, let it set, put your marbles in, then pour your next layer on top of that. I think you get the idea. As others have said, you can't use as heavy of a frangrance load as a MP or HP. Hope that helps.