Wedding Blog

Among my many wedding panics, a couple of months ago I started fretting about all of the tealights that were going to be on the reception tables. Wouldn’t the room look awful if all of them weren’t twinkling? Especially since we bought all of these pretty “bubble” tea lights from Crate & Barrel. They wouldn’t be nearly as cute if weren’t lit up! I’d heard that most tealights burn for around 4 hours on average… not ideal for our 6 hour reception.

I started researching tealights like crazy, and did find some websites that had “super tealights” that lasted for 8 or 10 hours. But they didn’t come cheap, and I struggled to find the ones that came in the clear cups (vs. silver).

Of course, I ended up doing what I always do, and checked out Etsy. I started finding different sellers with soy tea lights and learned that not only do they burn cleaner (better for the environment!), they also burn longer. I saw somewhere in the ballpark of 7 or 8 hours (depending on conditions - sheltered from a lot of breezes and burning all in one sitting are optimal).

Etsy seller Worthy Soy Candles had an amazing deal on these tealights, and I snagged 75 unscented white soy tea lights (in clear cups!) for $32.85 - that included shipping. This was much cheaper than I’d been pricing out other places. But… once they arrived, I had to put them to the test!

Fortunately, they threw in a free tealight with my purchase, so I didn’t have to use one from the wedding stash. My free candle was purple and lavender scented. Yum! But, unfortunately, I had to leave in the middle of the “experiment”, so I had to burn this candle in two sittings.

First Burn

Start: 3:40 pm

Stop: 6:25 pm

Time elapsed: 2 hours, 45 minutes

Second Burn

Start: 3:55 pm

Stop: 7:15 pm

Time Elapsed: 3 hours, 20 minutes

Total time candle burned: 6 hours, 5 minutes

Knowing that my tealights will last for our 6 hour reception: priceless

To what lengths have you gone to ensure your decor really goes the distance?