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Description

Create rainbow candles by melting and dyeing candles using the three primary colours.

Prefect for a mothers day gift or to celebrate a special occasion.

Resources

One plain white candle per child, plus a dozen or so extras (for melting and for the leaders)

Some candle dye in red, yellow and blue. (about £2.50 each, but you only need a small amount - a good one for sharing in sections)

3 jam jars

An old saucepan

Boiling water

Instructions

Melt two candles in the saucepan, and add a small amount of dye. Check the colour with an old candle and adjust as necessary. We went for very vibrant shades, but the image above is quite pastel. Put the molten dye into a jam jar 3/4 full of boiling water, so you have a centimetre or two of wax on the top. Keep this whole contraption hot by placing in another pan of boiling water on the hob. Repeat until you have 3 pots, one each of blue, red and yellow. Take the whole kit and caboodle to the table once ready to start.

Step 1. Put the candle, wick end first, into the yellow mix approximately two thirds of the way along. Dip in and out again quickly.
(We did this in a long line of kids, so that they never had to touch hot wax)
Shake the candle and have a small saucer or similar to drip any excess on before they leave the table.

Step 2. Holding the yellow end, repeat with the blue mix on the other side, approximately half of the way. The candle should now have a blue bottom, a green strip in the middle and a yellow top.

Step 3. Holding the yellow end, dip the blue end into the red mix, approximately half of the way across the blue.

Step 4. Holding the now purple end, dip the yellow end into the red mix, approximately two thirds of the way across the yellow. This will give you a candle with purple/blue/green/yellow/orange.

Step 5. Dip the orange candle top into the red mix, approximately half of the way across the orange.

Once you get the order down (which is not difficult if you remember your Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue, Purple), these are just excellent presents or just fun things to do.

UPDATE:

Make up the wax in advance in jam jars - either boiling wax on stove top (smoky) or by pouring boiling water on top of candles and keeping hot until wax melts. Add colour - it will dissolve in hot wax.

Once you have desired colours, leave in jam jars to cool. Then shift the disk of wax slightly and pour out the water.

This makes it easy and clean to transport

When you are 10-15 mins off doing the activity, boil the kettle and pour over the wax disc in the jam jar. Then keep warm.

Tags

• candles
• rainbow

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