Candles, insence, oils – we love our decadent witchy paraphenalia. But how do you clean an oil burner? How do you get wax out of your favourite jeans? And how do you get the limescale off your chalice?
Your witchy domestic problems solved, from one messy witch to another.
Getting Wax Drippings Out Of Stuff
Spilt wax on the carpet, your jeans, or your altar cloth? Fret not.
Get yourself a bunch of sheets of newspaper and an iron – preferably a crappy iron if you have a choice. Place the newspaper – 5 to 10 sheets is good – underneath the wax stain and on top of the stain. Get your iron and iron over it. The iron will melt the wax into the newspaper, which will lift it off the fabric. Refresh the newspaper when the wax has melted through all the layers of paper. Depending on how big the wax stain is, you might need to refresh the newspaper a few times.
- So if it’s an altar cloth, it’s sandwiched between two wadges of newspaper.
- If it’s a t-shirt or trousers, you have carefully put a thick layer of newpaper inside the t shirt and on top of the stain, so as not to just melt the wax through all lavers of clothing.
- On the carpet, just put a lot of newspaper on top of the stain.
Getting Rid Of Limescale Rings In Your Chalice
Limescale builds up over time even if you change the water every day. If you’ve not been changing the water as often as you wanted in your chalice (shhhhh) or if you let it all evaporate away you get epic crusty limescale rings in your beautiful chalice.
- When mine get crusty I fill up my chalice with white vinegar (the epically chap stuff from the supermarket) up to the limescale ring and leave it for 10-20 mins or so, then scrub the limescale away.
- You can also sprinkle some bicarbonate of soda onto a used lemon half and scrub away the limescale. This is what I do when I have used lemons rom drinks kicking around.
We’ve got jars of Distilled White Vinegar (the uber cheap stuff) stashed away in our cupboard for lots of limescale needs – around taps, in toilets, in the kettle, all sorts.
Getting That Crusty Yellow Oil Residue Out Of Your Oil Burner.
I’ve always got an essential oil burner on in my house (you know that thing that has a dish of water that you put essential oils in and a little tea light candle inside to warm it up), and that ring of burnt on oil you get around the water basin is a real bummer. When it builds up (because I am NOT an impeccably tidy witch), heating up the basin means the smell of all that burnt oil is released, so all your blends end up smelling the same after 40 mins or so. Rubbish.
If there’s not a lot, because you are not as lazy as I am, a soak in hot water and a scrub with dishpan soap should work. But if it’s a little more serious and stained your oil burner a crusty hello – perhaps to the point where it’s growing crystals of it’s own:
- Option 1 is getting rid of the residue by putting a generous amount of nail polish remover on a cotton wool ball or pad, soaking it into the crust and then scrubbing it away. Then a quick wash with some dish soap.
- Option 2: soak it in Vinegar. Vinegar solves all problems.
Getting Wax Out Of Glass Jars And Candlesticks
Maybe it’s an old votive candle, or a Seven Day, or one of those Yankee Candle jobs. Fill it with boiling water and all the wax will rise to the surface: as it cools it will form a perfect disk and you can just fish it out.
Be aware though that lots of commercial scented candles have the metal wick base glued into the bottom of the candle container, so you might need to get rid of that too. If there is a really awful amount of glue, a little bit of white spirit on a rag cleans it up real well – endless scrubbing and hot water kinda works too.
With candlesticks, hot water will do the job too. Soak the candlesticks in warm water, peel off what you can, and scrub off the rest.
Getting oil stains out of clothes
Ever accidentally dropped an open bottle of anointing oil on your jeans? Knocked over a pot full of oil on your altar? Got a bottle of oil with a cap that juuuust doesn’t close right and has been leaking all over your altar cloths? Yup. Been there. Getting oil out of clothes is tough. Here is what I find works.
- I spilt about 5 ml of sweet almond oil on my jeans the other day. What worked for me is immediately putting dish soap on the stain and scrubbing it in (to break up the oil and emulsify it a bit, lifting it off the fabric) and then immediately washing the skirt. However, maybe you don’t have time to immediately clean up like this.
- For a little splash of oil on cotton fabric, you can use rubbing alcohol or nail varnish remover on the reverse side of the fabric to break down the oil and lift it from the fabric, and then blot it with tissue. Follow with a warm rinse and a wash.
- Or, for all your other oil-removing needs, click here to find out what to do on other fabrics.
Do you have any other nifty domestic witch fixes for horrible messy mistakes?
If you do, share your wisdom in the comments!
Excellent cleaning tips. Thanks Demi.
I’m gonna try the get-wax-out-of-carpet one. There’s a patch of it on my floor that was improved by using a steam mop to soften it and paper towel to blot it…. and its not anywhere near as obvious now, but I still know it’s there.
My favourite way to clean a crusty oil burner is to put enough eucalyptus oil in it to cover the basin, and light the candle (or power it on if its electric) for 5 minutes, then blow out the candle (or turn it off) and wipe the basin with a paper towel. Eucalyptus oil is a great cleaner, it breaks down oil residue, and its cheap…. and it smells nice.
I’ve had a lot of success removing stains from clothing, that I thought would never come out, using a hair product called “Sculpture Gel Spray” – it’s an Australian product but I’m sure there are a lot of similar ones. This page shows the ingredients https://www.priceline.com.au/sculpture-sculpture-gel-spray-250-ml I’ve used it to remove heaps of stains including oil, permanent marker, and tar…. I spray some on the stain and then give it a quick scrub with a nail brush and then rinse…. usually after that the stain is completely gone, and then the clothing goes straight in the washing machine.
Discovering that gel spray works for stain removal was a complete accident – years ago I sprayed it on after braiding my daughters hair, and a bit got on the back of her shirt and it removed a permanent marker stain that had been there for months.
Hi Kym
Great advice! With weird witchy activities come a whole host of stains and housekeeping accidents.
That is so so weird about the hair gel. I’m going to file it in my brain and the next time I cover myself with markers or oil paint or bike grease I’ll look it up.
I think eucalyptus oil might be cheaper in Oz than in the UK – it’d cost me a fiver to fill up my oil burner with eucalyptus oil here, even though it would smell gorgeous and we’d all have clear sinuses for weeks 😀 xxxxx
I get my eucalyptus oil at the grocery store. Its in the health stuff section near the cotton wool balls and bandaids…. and its 200mls of 100% pure eucalyptus oil for less than ten bucks…. and often it comes on sale for just over five bucks. It’s much more expensive to buy it from a new age store or pharmacy.
It may just be an Oz thing though…..
Wooooow!!! I think that’s def an Oz thing. I’ve never seen it for sale over here…. but then again, maybe I was not looking hard enough… Tesco, Asda, I’m coming for you 😀