How to: Homemade Unity Candle Holder

Unity candle holders can be more than practical. They can represent you.

Couples use the unity candle ceremony during their wedding to signify the joining of two lives into one. The unity ceremony consists of two tapers --- long, thin candles --- and one pillar candle. The mothers of the bride and groom light the tapers either when entering the church or just before the unity ceremony. Then, the bride and groom each take the candle lit by her or his mother and together light the single pillar candle. While these candles are typically white, the unity ceremony is a way to express your individuality and what you will become as a couple. You can express this by creating unique candle holders that represent your personalities.

Instructions

1. Use a saucer plate from your grandmother's china set for the individual candles and a tea cup from your new set for the pillar. Use votive candles (the small candles) rather than taper candles since they will nestle in the saucer indentation and will not tip over easily.

2. Hot glue metal nuts together in a circle to form a candle holder for one taper. Hot glue the matching bolts together in a circle to form a candle holder for the other taper. Screw the nuts and bolts together to make a holder for the unity pillar.

3. Choose your favorite flower and weave a few together to make a holder for the taper or votive. Make your spouse-to-be choose his and do the same. Weave the two together to create the holder for the unity candle.

4. Pile colored sand, glass stones or aquarium rocks, one pile in your favorite color and one in his. Use the individual piles for the tapers and blend the two colors for the unity pillar.

Tips & Warnings

• Have fun. Make this something you and your spouse-to-be can do together. The unity candle represents who you will become, so use this as an opportunity to visually represent your future.

• Ask yourself and your spouse what reminds you of home and create candle holders to represent this. This works especially well if you come from two different backgrounds: farm boy and city girl, East Coast versus West Coast, snow and ice versus sunny beaches. Blend these disparate ideas together to represent what you each bring to your new life.

• When creating your unity candle holder, do not use flammable items. If you do use flammable material such as artificial flowers, be sure that the candle flame will remain above the height of the holder for the duration of the ceremony.

References

• CelebrateIntimateWeddings.com: The Unity Candle Ceremony
• Unity Candle: Unity Candle Holders