Ice Luminaries

I don't know about you,
but we had some frigid temperatures last week.
In fact, it didn't get up past freezing for over a week.
After leaving the Christmas tree (in the stand)
outside on the deck,
it was impossible to remove.
After the sun had been out a while,
I tried again and found this:

 
BRRRRRR!
We took the bitter cold in stride by mostly staying home
and enjoying the cozy fireplace. 

Embracing the season,
we made ice luminaries.

We repurposed two cans of different sizes

and placed the smaller into the larger.

Then we filled the space between them with water. 

You could also add berries, birdseed, or leaves

to the water to make them more decorative.

To keep the inner cans from floating,
we weighed them down with bricks.
These were left on the front porch overnight,
as we knew temperatures were set to fall below 32 degrees.

The next day when we checked on the cans,
sure enough, the water had frozen solid!

To remove the outer can,
we simply ran some water on the outside.
It slipped right out.
To loosen the inner can,
we just added water to the inside of the can.
Because we used a larger can with ribbing,
this transferred onto our luminary.
Voila!

We loved the way they turned out!
Adding a votive or tea light candle made them sparkle.

You could also use the battery-operated tea lights.

Depending on where you live,
you could line your pathways with these sweet things
and savor them all winter.
What a fun science project for kids!
Our cold snap has come and gone,
so ours have long since melted.
But you can be sure if it returns,
we'll be fashioning a few more of these to enjoy!