Today is the feast of St. James the Greater. It also happens to be a Nameday in our home! I had all sorts of ideas for celebrating… However, after spending most of the day in town for car repairs, errands, and a major grocery shopping trip, I had to keep it simple. We had Baked Chicken and salad for dinner, followed by a scoop of ice cream for the kids. After dinner we made this simple St. James Cross and Shells Candle!
Supplies:
1 White Pillar Candle
Sea Shells
(including Cockle Shells, the Symbol of St. James)
Gold Decorating Wax
or all 
First we glued the Sea Shells around the base of the candle. This was the perfect opportunity to try out my new CoolTool Ultra Low Temp Glue Gun
(I got mine with a coupon at Michaels). I’m in love! As always I ended up getting the glue all over my fingers, and, for the first time, I am not covered with blisters! 😉
(I got mine with a coupon at Michaels). I’m in love! As always I ended up getting the glue all over my fingers, and, for the first time, I am not covered with blisters! 😉 The Low Temp of the glue, in addition to being much safer than the hot glue, also worked out perfectly for decorating the candle, since it didn’t melt the wax.
After we finished placing the shells I cut out a St. James Cross from Gold Candle Decorating Wax
. (The gold wax works so nicely for creating all sorts of candles – a Christ Candle for Christmas, a Paschal Candle for Easter, etc…) First I printed out an image (resizing it to fit our candle), and then cut it out in two pieces from our strip of wax, using an exacto knife. We then placed the wax cross onto the candle.
. (The gold wax works so nicely for creating all sorts of candles – a Christ Candle for Christmas, a Paschal Candle for Easter, etc…) First I printed out an image (resizing it to fit our candle), and then cut it out in two pieces from our strip of wax, using an exacto knife. We then placed the wax cross onto the candle.
That’s it! It only took about 10-15 minutes to make from start to finish, and we ended up with a beautiful candle to decorate our table, in honor of St. James.
O Glorious Saint James, because of your fervor and generosity Jesus chose you to witness his glory on the Mount and his agony in the Garden. Obtain for us strength and consolation in the unending struggles of this life. Help us to follow Christ constantly and generously, to be victors over all our difficulties, and to receive the crown of glory in heaven. Amen.
St. James the Greater, one of the Glorious Twelve, Ora pro nobis.
St. Christopher, Ora pro nobis.
So Jessica, I'm always curious about something when I see a new craft or feastday decorations being made in your home…
Where do you store all of these decorations for the various feastdays? I have a hard enough time finding placed for Christmas and Easter decorations.
What do you do?
A wonderful way to celebrate 🙂
very cute and creative. never heard of such a glue gun.
Meg ~ It seems that I often lean towards "crafting" with food, which completely eliminates the need for storage. This candle will not be stored. I placed it on our dining room table and we will light it each night during dinner for the rest of the summer, most likely.
I too find it challenging enough, just storing our Christmas and Easter items… In the past I would make so many more crafts with my children, now I lean towards only those that are edible, beautiful, and/or functional. The rest don't last long in our home. 😉
For our mantel letters, and other small seasonal decorations I am trying to implement one of Charlotte's Ideas: Liturgical Boxes.
Hope that helps!
What a lovely St. James cross candle with the pilgrim shell decorations, Jessica! Re Meg's inquiry, I too used Charlotte's inspiration and now have Liturgical boxes for storage of our liturical and seasonal decorations. a picture of how we store things is at the bottom of this post: http://lovemylittleflower.blogspot.com/2010/05/yay-for-organization.html
Lovely blog on Seasonal candles
Keep up the good work.
Thanks for sharing.
Good job
Keep sharing more and more.