10 candle hacks
- fallwinterparty
- Sep 8, 2018
- 5 min read
to burn your favorite scents at the best and cozy up with no worries
Apple pie, sparkly cinnamon, pumpkin cupcake, gingerbread, vanilla frosting, comfy sweaters, maple buttercream, Christmas garland, butter cookies, pretzels. How many candle flavors have you tasted so far? Well, for as many as you may have burned in your house, there’s still plenty of them out there to try. Candles are probably one of the most requested products during this time of the year. Who doesn’t love having a cozy evening on the sofa wrapped up in a blanket with your favorite hot drink, a good book or a movie, maybe listening to the lovely sound of a storm outside, all at magical light of a scented candle?
It's just incredible how even a tiny IKEA tealight in a cute holder can transform a room and make the coziest mood. Autumn and Winter are the best time to buy candles, because all the amazing scents are inspired by the things that we love the most about these seasons.
There’s actually a huge variety of candles nowadays, and some of them can also be very expensive depending on the brand, quality, burning times. In addition to enjoy our favorite scents, it’s important to preserve them and create a safe space to make them last longer, burn evenly and protect our houses.
So here’s 10 candle hacks to take care of your candles and home environment every time you burn your favorite scent.
1. Always trim your candle wick!
It is important to trim your wick every time you decide to burn your candle. This will give you a much cleaner light and prevent from create smoke in the jar as well as in your room. After you have burned your candle for about 2-3 hours, extinguish the flame, let the candle cool down completely and then trim the wick to 1/8 of an inch – 3 mm. You can use a pair of little scissors or buy a wick trimmer to get the job perfectly done.
2. Never place your candles near moving air!
Find the right spot in your house to place your candles. It can be on a coffee table, a shell, your desk, a nightstand, but make sure that your candles are safe from any air source. If you place a candle near a fan, an open window or an ac units the air will disturb the flame creating black smoke that will probably stick to the jar. The air can also fan the flame and damage your house.
3. Never burn your candles for more than 3-4 hours in one sitting
Lighting a candle and then completely forgetting about it. It can happen, we’ve all been there. But it can be very dangerous. In fact, if you leave your candle burning for more than 3-4 hours the flame will get really large and start to release smoke in the air. The jar will also get very hot and too hard to handle. So, light your candle for a maximum of 3-4 hours and then wait at least 2 more hours before relighting it.
4. Allow your candle to create a full melt pool during your first burning session
So you just got a brand new scented candle and you can’t wait to light it, maybe only for a few minutes just to sniff this new amazing smell of the season. Wrong! It’s a good rule to give your candle the right time to burn for the first time: it needs to create a full melt wax pool from side to side to burn evenly and avoid tunneling during the next burning sessions.
5. Shop for nice holders and plates!
It’s important to protect the surfaces you’re going to place your candles on, so make sure to use candle holders, plates and vase when burning your favorite scents. You can buy some really cute ones in stores and online or if you’re feeling crafty you can create your very own candle holder with a few items that you probably already have at home!
6. Did you split some wax on your table or other surfaces? No problem!
Wax can be very tricky to remove: one moment it’s in a liquid consistency hot as hell and one moment after it’s rock hard. Don’t panic. Just take your hair dyer, warm the wax up a little and then remove it with a dry towel. Easy peasy!
7. Never blow on your candles!
Okay, time to blow our tealights out. I bet you usually blow on the flame, maybe some wax splits out of the jar and the wick stars to create smoke. Well, the best way to avoid that is to use a glass or a little jar to put the flame down. Just put the glass on top of your tealight (make sure that it’s large enough) and the flame will extinguish in a few seconds. Wait for about 10 minutes before removing the glass or the smoke will be released in the air.
When you’re burning a larger candle, like a Bath&Body Works or a Yankee Candle one, the best thing to do is to use the candle lid to eliminate the oxygen from the jar and naturally blow off the flame. After 10-15 minutes, you can remove the lid, clean the glass from any smoke residue and close your candle for the next burning session.
8. Use a silicone cupcake mold to burn votives and wax melts
When we burn little candles such as the Yankee Candle’s votives or any wax melts, the wax can stick to the melter we’re using or burn not in the way we were hoping. So we basically end up with a huge wax mess. Well, this trick can literally change your wax melting game. All you need is a silicone cupcake mold. Place your wax melt or votive into the mold and that’s it! When the wax will get solid again you can easily remove it from the silicone and use it again with no problems. This method will save all your wax melters and candle holders from ruining and avoid any waste of wax (and money!).
9. Freeze your candles!
Yep, you heard it right. That’s the best trick to save your jars and any residue of wax encrusted on the bottom. Pop your candles in the freezer for about 20 hours and when the wax is rock solid you can easily stab it with a knife and remove it from the jar. In this way you can re-use the wax by melting it (using the silicone mold method) and save your jars from the trash too! Clean them out (also boil them for at least 40 minutes if you want to use them to store food or spices) and they’re going to be ready for a new life!
10. Always read the label
Every candle comes with a label that will give all the information you need about weight, burning times, safety rules, so make sure to read it! I know it can sound not much of a big advice, but it’s really important to know everything about the products you buy and use.
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