Giant Birthday Candles

In case you didn't know, I am now a birthday party host for Jo-Ann's Fabrics and Crafts.  Well, over the weekend we had an open house to promote the classes and birthday party services offered at Jo-Ann's.  I wanted to make sure my part of the table stood out, so I made 3 giant birthday candles to sit on my end. 

I came across the idea on pinterest (which originated from here). I didn't create mine the same way she did but the end result was about the same.  Here's how I did mine...

Giant cardboard tubes
        (I got mine from Jo-Ann's for free - these are the long sturdy tubes that
         come from the home decor fabrics once the fabric has all been bought)
White acrylic paint
Duct tape (in the color you want)
Yellow and Orange Foam Sheet
Foam sheet matching the color of your duct tape
White Felt
White Pipe Cleaner
.5 yards of Tulle (matching the color of the duct tape)
Foam brush
CD
glue gun
hacksaw

Begin with figuring out how tall you want your candle or candles.  Use the hacksaw to cut the desired length to your candle.  Now paint the entire tube with white acrylic paint. If you want, you can seal the paint with an acrylic sealer once it is dry. I didn't seal mine.

Now that it is dry, apply the colored duct taped at an angle starting at the very top and wrapping it all the way down to the bottom.  Make sure to let the duct tape have a wide enough angle to leave parts of the white showing through when it wraps around the tube.

Get the CD and place your duct tape wrapped tube on top in the middle part of the CD.  Take small, long strips of duct tape and tape the ends of the tube to the CD.  Do it all around the bottom part.  In this case, less is not more as you want that tube not to be able to tilt over and separate easily from the CD.

The picture above doesn't look like I put a lot of duct tape at the bottom, but trust me I did.  The picture was taken in the early stages of my attaching the 2 together.

From here I decided to make the flame.  I used yellow and orange foam and just freehandedly cut out a flame shape. I cut 2 of each color.  Make sure the yellow part matches up as you will be sandwiching the pipe cleaner in between the yellow part.  Once everything is cut, first hot glue the pipe cleaner to the inside of the yellow foams then hot glue the yellow foam together.  Now hot glue the orange foam flame shape to both sides of the yellow foam flame.

Take the white felt and trace the top of the tube onto the felt.  Cut out that circle and make a small slit in the center of that felt circle.  Insert the pipe cleaner into the slit and then bend the pipe cleaner into an "L" shape right at the base of the underneath side of the felt. From there just wrap the pipe cleaner into a circle shape and hot glue it to the felt. This makes the felt sturdier and stronger.

Hot glue the circle felt onto the top of the tube.

It is now time to cover up the ugliness of the CD and all that duct tape mess at the bottom.  NOTE: It's probably best to do this part BEFORE you make and attach the flame but if you didn't, no worries ... it still works.  You're going to take your same color as the duct tape foam and trace the CD onto the foam and cut out.

 

 Now cut a bunch of slits in the middle (star like slits).  Make sure it's big enough because you are going to feed the tube through this slit.  It has to fit the flame first then the tube.

Hot glue the circle parts of the foam to the CD and the slit peaks onto the tube.

Take your matching color tulle and cut it into squares about 5x5 or 6x6.  I didn't do exact measurements, just kind of eyeballed the cut.  That's just how I fly.  :-)

Take a square tulle and place your finger in the middle of the square.  Pull up the sides to cover up your finger and then holding the tip of the tulle where the tip of your finger is, remove your finger.

 

Pinch that tip and add hot glue all around it.  You will now apply it quickly to the base of the tube to hide all that hot mess at the bottom of the tube. 

 Repeat the process of the tulle until you have covered up the whole bottom.

 Once it is all covered, then you are DONE!  Enjoy the cute creation!!!

Here's my end of the table.  You can also get an idea of how big these candles are with this picture.  I'm only 5'2".

Hope you enjoyed!  I know I did.  :-)

~Peechee