Throwback Thursday: Waxing Nostalgic About Valentines Day

When I was in High School, the Student Government used to sell carnations for Valentine's Day. For the bargain-basement price of $1, you could have a carnation delivered to your sweetheart, complete with a personal message inscribed on a card in some Sophomore's best attempt at calligraphy. The carnations were temporarily stored in large buckets of water in the front office, where every student office aid was able to read every heartfelt message.

That always felt like a huge invasion of privacy to me, and, I wasn't wrong,  because it was how Kim found out that Greg was cheating on her with April as well as the reason that everyone in school discovered that the the quietest girl in the Freshman class had multiple secret admirers.

Of course, none of that prevented me from purchasing carnations for my boyfriend; I just made sure that the message attached to his flowers was sealed.

These days, I am still penning notes for my Valentines, and, attaching them to gifts, and, while there is no Junior class busy-body snooping through them looking for a new piece of gossip to share on the quad; I still seal them. 

With a kiss, of course. 

This year, however, I am including a wax seal for good measure. I'm using this cute set that I found on Amazon.

It contains wax pellets in a variety of colors, tweezers for handling the pellets, a burner, a metal wax ladle, tea lights, embossing pens and embossing dust, and a stamp. The stamp that came in the set features a Tree of Life design, but I purchased an additional stamp with a heart design specifically for Valentine's Day.

The burner and melting ladle are really easy to use; you just light the wick on a tea light, place it under the burner, add wax pellets to the ladle, and set it on the burner until the pellets are melted.

When the wax is ready, the ladle makes it easy to pour a perfect circle, which, I always struggle to do when I am using my wax sticks and a lighter.

I always wait just about 15-20 seconds for the wax to start to cool before I press my stamp into the middle of the circle. Then, I let the stamp sit for an additional 10-15 seconds before I pull it off the wax, just to ensure a good imprint.

The pens that came with the set are great for helping the details of the imprint to really pop, and, while I didn't use the embossing glitter on this particular card; I know it will be something that I will use in future projects.

This card will accompany Hugh's Valentine's Day gift, which, I assure you, is not a bouquet of carnations.

As an aside, am I the only one for whom the spicy scent of carnations will be forever enter-twined with Cupid's holiday? Surely I can't be alone in this.