Crafting fail

The kids and I had thought we found the perfect DIY Christmas project to give Papa and Grandpa for Christmas.  They both love starting a nice warm fire as evidence of Grandpa here...

We had seen this craft all over pinterest and blogs.  So we figured we would give it a go.   

One thing I have to say to all those bloggers who posted their how to steps on this is... SHAME!!!! While we are pleased with the end result of this project...getting there was wayyyyy harder than anyone had led on.

The step by step calls only for Pine cones, candle wicking, wax and cupcake liners.  We feel like we are pretty crafty folks so we decided to add coloring and a Cinnamon scent as well.

Please note that this is truly the only step of the process that a child can and should help you with.  Placing already wicked pine cones in cupcake liners, it takes all of 2 minutes...Then they must vacate the area as they will most like be scalded with hot molten wax or possibly over hear you using foul language under your breath. 

This child, my super crafter, is using a super sharp butcher knife to cut the huge blocks of wax into teeny tiny pieces...don't worry this step only takes an hour or two...

You melt the wax, in 15 separate batches, (it takes about 45 minutes per batch)...and hot wax and water will splatter all over your stove and floor and may possibly singe your skin when you try to move it or turn down the heat.  

Once you have braved melting the wax, pouring it into the cupcake liners, searing your fingertips, and making a total wreck of every available surface in your kitchen,  use a butter knife to scrape off wax and reposition the pine cones so you set them up for another go around.

Keep pouring the wax until the bottom of the wick is covered with wax, otherwise...reposition all wicks and repour...again..

Try to ignore all of your other children when they ask if you are ever going to be done with this project, so you can feed them and they can actually get out of their pajamas by lunch time and maybe have a small chance at interacting with you at some point in the day..

6 hours later, when you are finally done...show off your biggest and smallest creation and act like it was all worth it.

They did turn out nice, but do not be fooled, 5 hour project with at least 1 hour of clean up... pots and pans that had to hit the trash rather than deal with hours of scrubbing...  If you decided to try this one...don't say you weren't warned :)  

Today we will be doing our annual cookie bake off and we are expecting much better results :)
Merry Christmas!!!!!!!