Gel Candle Design: Hatching Turtle Gel Candles

Ron Giordani of Mystic Candles

The one thing that my wife Ruth and I figured out is, when it comes to gel candles, the sky is the limit with your creativity.

There are so many candles that can be made with the help of your imagination or some idea nature shares with us.

What we did here was create a simple candle that brings out the "Awhhh! How cute!" from almost everyone that has seen it.Nature played a big hand with this candle with some imagination tucked in there. Simple!

I wanted the candle to have a natural setting. while giving the appearance of an actual hatching and not going overboard on the scene.

To do this you'll need the following items:
4oz Ivy Bowl
White Aquarium sand (use a good quality sand as cheaper brands tend to bleed)
Natural color or play sand
Ceramic Turtle hatchling (www.rusticesentuals.com or www.silkytyme.com)
1pound of Penreco MP Gel
Gel Wick
Pebbles
Very small seashells
Your favorite gel candle safe scent.

Step1
We start by placing the wick in the Ivy bowl. We use wick stickums to keep the wick in place. For those of you who do not know what they are, these are a double-sided tape cut in a circle to match your wick tab.

Step2
Using a clean bowl or glass. I mix equal amounts of white and play sand together. The objective here is to create tropical color sand. You can use your own judgment on how light or dark you want to make your mix. When you are satisfied with your sand mix, pour some into the Ivy bowl.

Tilt the bowl on and angle to make like a sand dune on the beach. Set the jar on your workbench. I then added the turtle on the left side of the bowl, placing it midway in the sand dune. Using a spoon, I took more of the sand mixture and gently placed it around the eggshell while building areas up behind and under the turtle. You can design this anyway you like.

Now you can add some pebbles behind the turtle and scatter some small seashells for a shoreline affect. You can also add some sea grass, use a little green sand in small areas behind the turtle or find something like small rustic tin vines from a craft shop to give a dead seaweed appearance. Take your time and blend your scene together. If you don't like how your candle appears, start over!

Remember. The whole idea is to create something that looks natural.

Step 3
Use gel candle safe scent. You can use coconut, mango or some other tropical type scent to tie in this candle scene. We use our own custom blend called Island Dreams in this design.

Step 4
Now that you decided what scent to use, it's time to heat up your Gel. While the Gel heats up, you can use a heat gun at the middle or the low setting to pre-warm the glass and embed to help reduce the amount of air bubbles.

When your Gel is heated and scent has been added and mixed well, slowly pour your hot Gel over the sand until it's covered.

Let this cool. This step helps keep the sand locked in place and reduces air purging from the sand. I sometimes wait for an hour before I pour the remaining Gel. It also depends on how many candles I've got to do. I've also gone as far as to finish the pour the next day.

Final Step
When it's time to heat the Gel back up, we like to heat it up slowly so we don't burn off too much scent. Gently warm the glass and the top of the gel from the first pour with a heat gun at the low setting. When your Gel reaches pouring temperature, fill your candle to your desired height.

Conclusion
This candle will bring a smile to you and your customers. Just looking at the candle. you can almost visualize this little turtle scampering to the warm waters of the ocean, to start a life long journey of exploration of it's new world.

Turtles courtesy RusticEscentuals http://www.RusticEscentuals.com	Turtles courtesy SilkyTyme http://www.SilkyTyme.com