Difficulty Rating -

Posh candles can be rather expensive, but they can really add some glamour to a room. Household candles are really cheap but look drab. Have you ever thought of making your own posh candles from cheap drab candles? It's really easy and they make perfect gifts.

All you need is...
Some flowers, leaves, confetti, sequins, beads, cheap household candles, hot water and greaseproof paper. The flowers, leaves and any other greenery need to be pressed. To do this, simply place the flowers and leaves between sheets of newspaper and put this between the pages of a big book. Put it somewhere flat and stack other heavy books of top of it. If a week they should be pressed enough to work with. Take a piece of greaseproof paper, it doesn't need to be very wide, just enough to wrap around the candle a couple of times.

Arrange the candle decorations (leaves, flowers, beads, confetti, sequins and other bits and bobs) on the greaseproof paper. Don't put on too many and don't overlap them too much. There is only candle wax to stick it to the candle.

Put the candle on top of the decorations. Roll the candle up in the paper so that all the decorations are in direct contact with the candle. Twist the ends of the paper to keep the candle tightly wrapped. It will look a bit like a long thin Christmas cracker.

You will need a container that is as tall as the candle and which can hold boiling water. A plastic jug would do. Fill the jug with boiling water.

Taking great care, hold your candle at the top or the wick end, lower the candle parcel into the water so that all the decorations are under the water line. Hold it there for about 20 seconds.

Take the candle parcel out and wrap it up in a towel. Roll the sausage of towel and candle parcel back and forth as if it were a rolling pin. Do this for about 20 seconds.

Carefully unwrap the candle from the towel and from the greaseproof paper.

Finally holding the wick, dunk the candle in the hot water for 5 seconds or so. This smoothes the surface and applies a thin layer of wax over the design to fix it into place. Hold the candle by the wick and give it a minute or so for the wax to cool and harden before setting it down and to not alter the shape.

Easy!