Carved Candles.

I’m telling my friend Keni about my carved candles, and eventually had to show him a picture of one just to give him a better idea of what the hell I was talking about. The first impression most people seem to think is…”Oh neat! Could you carve me a wolf?”

No.

Those are molded candles, for the most part. I’m sure there’s someone with the skills to go take a chunk of wax and go about carving the figure of whatever’s heart’s desire and all…but since most 3D related art and sculptures have never been my forte, I can guarantee that I will not be making such candles without the aid of a prefabricated mold. End of the discussion.




However…THIS…the image above…is what I’m talking about. Carved ribbon candles! This one up above in fact was carved by myself probably about a good six or so years ago. The white wax unfortunately has started to fade at the bottom, but time will do that to anything that involves dyed colors. BUT THIS IS WHAT I WANT TO DO WITH THE REST OF MY LIFE.



Karper came over one time and took a look at one I had managed to have unpacked at the time, and instantly wanted to learn how to make it. He’s got a lot of energy about him, wanting to learn and teach…but it was good to see the enthusiasm in his eyes when I talked to him about the processes that go into making these candles. Even one of my managers was happy to hear that I have a plan…or a hope, or a dream to work towards. She says too many people don’t have them around here; that…or don’t express them so openly.



And I honestly wouldn’t mind teaching other people how to make them! It’s really a beautiful and relaxing craft to learn, and great for someone like me who wants to get things done quickly…as you don’t have much time to mess around with it to begin with! Back in the day I was the one teaching the roommate I used to work with at the time. The company I want to order my supplies from does things just a little differently from what I learned, but only to be conducive towards not using full length wicks, but instead using oil wicks…which in my opinion is a lot better because then you don’t have to worry about accidently burning or melting the design. I learned that as much as you can give people instructions on how to care for your candle when burning it, they never pay attention to what they’re doing.



BUT OH! When you do light them up! The way the colors glow! It’s the most enchanting thing! I swear, I could get lost just watching the flames flicker from deep down inside a well burned candle and just marvel at the way the colors light up. Truly a beautiful sight to see, but not so well captured on the camera…at least not by myself. And there’s so much more you can do with them! If the well inside is deep and wide enough, you can plop a smaller candle, like a tea-light or votive, inside and let it burn…even the scented ones! It becomes a candle holder! How many candles do that and still look just as pretty, huh?



Do you see what it is I’m saving my money up for? I heard there’s a shop in Hawaii that sells them, but there isn’t one in Savannah anymore! I left the shop I used to work for roughly 2-3 years before they closed down. That place had stayed open for…roughly over 20 years. And then…the original older sold it…to which it was given as a wedding gift by the bride’s father. Apparently the husband and wife who I used to work for used to work for the original owner. I was told it was thriving back in those days, before they were given ownership of it. And somehow, they ran it into the ground! How sad, right…but it was primarily because they never got anything shipped out on time. How do you expect to keep happy customers if you don’t get their order done in time, right? Plus…you don’t see these kinds of candles everywhere. Scented candles, you see them all over the place! But these? Hardly anywhere, right? I’ve searched online, and can’t find a place that carves a decent one. Always someone’s attempt at them, but nothing as well crafted as what I’ve seen and made.

I plan on starting out small. I won’t be able to open a shop right off from the start, but my sister’s been telling me that as a female making less than the average yearly income, I should be able to get some grants to help start a business up. But all the research I’ve done in the past has left me rather confused as to how to get it. Honestly. Something always made me hesitate in taking that step forward; probably all the legal mumbo-jumbo that’s written in such huge and complicated words that I can’t understand what it is that I’m reading. Why can’t lawyers and government officials use laymen terms?

I think I need to have a garage sale…get rid of the crap I’ve got stored away with absolutely no use for.

So Easily Discouraged.

Which is not something that my sister Statler wants to hear about, as she knows too many people who express the negative side of things so often that she herself is having a hard time keeping positive for them. And yet, I’m the same way as I convince my friends to vent it all out in hopes that at least expressing their frustrations will help to ease a weight upon their shoulders that simply listening is the only way that I can really help. Then an intense force drives me down as things start turning sour in my direction…



This month’s First Friday was a rather low blow. The past couple of months, sales had increased by a little bit, but with the lack of anything new to show and still no real interest in the character prints or comics (except for the two guys that want me to draw up their stories for them, which I’m still quietly excited about), I had a gut feeling that things would go well this month. I really need to listen to my gut feeling more often. One could easily blame it on the weather this time around, though I honestly think that last month’s location was rather ideal over where they normally hold the show. They tried to make it better by blocking off one of the streets to help deal with vehicle traffic…but that’s neither here or there right now. This time around it was rather windy, which grew to be so strong that it not only managed to knock my canopy over, but the display wall, easel, and table over. It was a mess…but on the bright side, my windows didn’t break. I lost a stein, which no one seemed to have much interest in anyways, my framed prints need to be cleaned up a bit…and after trying to set things back up again and helping my neighboring booth deal with her canopy and other things that had fallen, my stuff got blown over again. “I think it’s time we pack it up for the night.” We only had a half hour before the show was over anyways, and by the time we got home…it started to rain. I suppose the gods were just looking out for me and didn’t want my stuff to get wet, but did they have to cause such a mess?



I’m sure I wasn’t alone in being discouraged by the evening, as the cute blond guy I shall name Karper sat with me at my booth for a good portion of the show when people who were suppose to speak at his reading and discussion at the library canceled on him. We talked about it…he bought a couple of comics, who’s proceeds went to buying my lunch the next day at work…heh…that’s twice now that he’s paid for lunch. I really ought to return the favor sometime. Hmm…right, so then I got to meet his cousins, and when things just fell apart on me, he and his family helped to clean and pack things up. I attempted to read the first poem in a book of poetry he had left at my booth when he went off to chat with people, but I kept on getting interrupted by the wind; first in helping the food vendor cleaning up some chips that had tried to make an escape, and then by my booth deciding that flying away was on its agenda as well. For what little of it I read, I liked the point of view of the poem!



Karper is one of the two guys that want me to draw up their stories for them. The other is ET, who amazingly is unable to stay awake through the movie by the same name, and thus has been unable to see it in its entirety. The same movie that I cried through the ending of because I didn’t want ET to go home! ET has a great story idea that just puts me in a fit of giggles every time I look at the synapses, however…I’m finding that I’m having difficulty figuring out what the characters are suppose to look like. I don’t know if it means that my imagination is broken due to years of…? I honestly don’t know what the problem could be. The idea behind it is neat, and I think it would be a fun read…but…I have more questions behind the development more so than ideas of how it could look. I’m taking this as a bad sign. My dad suggested to just draw up something that first comes to mind to see if it goes along with what the guy wants…but I can’t even do that. I look at the list of characters, and then at the drawing of the vehicle he sent me…and everything just goes blank in my head.



But I’m trying to use such developmental inquiries on yet another project that my friend Keni wants me to write with him; a three book series on the adventures of two of our characters that we play on a game. But even this I found myself getting annoyed with because while he focuses on developing the two main characters (which is fine and important ), I’m trying to get him to focus on developing the world! I can’t think about what a plot or character might be if I don’t know what the world is like? What’s my character’s views on this…well how the hell should I know if I don’t know what this is?! Heh…but I went and took him by surprise by shooting off a bunch of none descriptive questions/options to him over text message while he was on a house hunting trip. From this, I’ve created the skeletal basis of a world for him to peruse when he gets internet access again. Here’s hoping I can get him to focus on that for a bit.



The lack of sales in my shops is discouraging as well, though I half expected it. I don’t have any ideas on how to cheaply advertise a bunch of products online, and the grapevine seems to have shriveled up and died on me. I should forewarn Statler of this before she has me painting anything wine related…out of fear that such ventures will look rather desolate.



Anyways…how do you like the random, old and new art that I have floating around on my computer. Some of them are projects I picked up from friends and family, others were just random things that I might do something with later down the road. We’ll see.