Christmas Presents #1 – Heart Candle Holder

I always appreciate getting hand-made gifts, so for Christmas I decided to make personalised gifts out of wood for various people. This is the first of the five projects I worked on for Christmas 2018 and I am very happy with the results. For one of my best friends, who is currently going through a rough time, I made a heart shaped tea light candle holder and my wife Jenny (who has awesome handwriting) wrote an uplifting phrase from Harry Potter on the back. To start, after planning everything out on paper, I made a template out of mdf so I could check the size worked correctly with a tea light.

I then transferred the template to some pine and cut out the heart shape using a coping saw. Following that I sanded going up through the grits to smooth the edges of the heart and round the curves.

I then used a saw drill bit and a spade drill bit to cut a hole into the centre of the heart for the tea light. Then I did a whole lot more sanding to smooth the edges of the heart and the inside of the tea light hole.

My wife Jenny has fantastic handwriting and wrote a quote said by Dumbledore in Harry Potter on the back – “Happiness can be found even in the darkest of times if one only remembers to turn on the light”.

Jenny and I gave the heart to our best friend for Christmas and she really loved it! Follow my next few posts for the other present projects I made this year. 🔨