Winter Life with Beeswax Candle Light

Christmastide is over and the spring dreams rush in the void left by the end of the holiday season. The lull of the season, January and February are quite uneventful in our cold climate. The daily rhythm is composed of making fire, feeding goats, harvesting eggs, collecting firewood, and filling bird feeders. The ground is hard frozen, and sheep's bellies are swelling with lambs. In late evenings and early mornings and at meal times we use tall beeswax candles, to transition us to and from the darkness of the night and to offer its warm delicate glow.

Toddler at work, washing dishes in early evening.

Tall candles are not only lovely, they are essential when it comes to providing adequate light. All the variety of candle shapes found in stores is useless for this purpose, meant for ambiance and mood setting, not for the task of making light. With tall candles one can read, prepare food, go about most household tasks - but a correct candle holders is important. A high candle holder helps your candle to remain high, even as it burns out. Flame needs to be elevated a about 8" minimum, so even a 4-5" high candle holder makes your candle last longer.

Beeswax candles don't drip unless they are placed in a drafty location, and they don't smoke. The flames are even, and bright. But it still helps to have a candle holder that will catch dripping wax and one that is very easy to hold and walk with - that way you can carry your candle from room to room, in quiet darkness of the winter night.

Our days end early and begin before dawn, and candle light is with us on both ends of the day. Candle travels from the bathroom to the living room, following our early-rising toddler and keeping away harsh, bright, so unceremoniously blinding electrical light.  Evening baths, night time stories, morning tea making all done with candles too. Washing dishes? You bet.  A good bulk source of candles is here.