Creating inexpensive decorations for holiday time can not only be a fun family activity, but it’s a great way to use what you have, or only purchase cheap, inexpensive supplies.
Several years ago, I made candy corn votive holders. I thought I would share so that you too can make these inexpensive, easy decorations to place around your home.
I created these with my son when he was about three or four. He is twelve now and we’ve used them every year since. And now I see manufactured candle holders quite similar to these at the stores for quite a bit more than the supplies cost me all together.
Candy Corn Votive Candle Holder
You will need:
Pots
Various sized Terra Cotta pots. I used several different sizes so I could put them together in clusters and use different candles.
Candles
All different shapes and sizes in white, orange, yellow or black. Scented candles are great, but try to stick to vanilla because it gives off a very realistic scent.
Paint
Acrylic paints are best because they stay on better. You will need yellow, white and orange, unless you’d like to make one of the chocolate kind, then you will need some brown.
A Tie
Not an actual tie that someone wears, but something to tie around the neck. We used raffia because it has a natural color and feel to it, but ribbon, embroidery floss or just about anything else that can be tied will work.
Hot glue
Hot glue is not actually a necessity, however it works better than any other glue and if you want to be sure everything stays planted in place, it is better to glue everything down.
Filler
You can get this at any craft store. It is what will surround your candle inside the pot and hold it in place. We used orange, but there are natural colors too.
Here is what you will do. Take the clay pot and paint it all white even on the inside. Consider this your base coat. Paints are absorbed easily into a clay pot so a base coat is necessary. Make sure that the pot is completely white, and that no Terra Cotta color is showing through. This is important because one area will not get any other color paint on it.
Allow this to dry for at least 2 hours. Read the paint tube you use, as it will tell you exactly how long to wait.
I recommend doing a bunch of these at a time so you can allow them to dry while you are working on more.
Once dry, you will paint the bottom half yellow. You will then need to allow that area to dry for at least the alloted time. This is why I encourage you to make several at a time, so you can be doing multiple clay pots at a time while others are drying!
Last, you will paint the middle of the pot orange. You can make this part as big or as small as you would like, just be sure to start from the top rim and work your way down.
As you can see from the photo, we did different size bands because all candy corns are different.
Next, if you plan not to light the candles, you may wish to hot glue some colored filler into the bottom of the pot on the inside. We used orange filler. This adds a little height to the candle so it can be seen above the rim of the pot.
Use however much it takes to lift that little votive candle up.
Since you aren’t lighting this candle, you can even put it up around the candle all the way to the neck. We did this too, except you can’t see it in the picture. It’s smashed down a little.
Place your candle inside the pot. We hot glued some of them to hold them in place, and other’s we just stuck in there. If you are planning on lighting these, you will need to find a way to elevate the candle another way. A cut piece of Styrofoam works well and cannot be seen.
When you are done with all that, you can tie a piece of natural raffia around the outside of the pot. You can even dangle buttons or charms from the ends. It adds a nice natural touch, that isn’t there without it.
Now you have an adorable easy to make centerpiece. Cluster these together in various places throughout the house. You can reuse them year after year.