Wooden Blocks With Beeswax Finish

My Dad is awesome. Most folks who know him know that. He builds fantastic things for people. Recently, he did a job and had some lovely blocks left over. I very gladly took them home with me. While the kids played with the hose and buckets in the yard, I used my fantastic power sander (that I bought new in box at a yard sale for $5 ^_^) to round the sharp edges and smooth them out.

Freshly sanded blocks

Although they were lovely and soft after being sanded, I have a crazy wood texture issue and I needed to do something to make them smoother to the touch. Enter Beeswax Polish. Here is the recipe I used- Beeswax Recipe

You need one part beeswax and 4 parts oil. You can use any oil you like! I used coconut oil because I have a a lot. Olive oil will have a slightly green tint to it. A great friend of mine gave me a block of beeswax. 

The first step is to put the oil and the beeswax together- I recommend just putting them both in the jar you plan on storing the finish in. The recipe recommends shredding the wax so that it melts quicker. I will definitely do that next time. My 1/4 cup chunk of beeswax took about thirty minutes to melt. You can either melt in the microwave or in a double boiler. I put my jar in a pot of water and boiled it. As I said- this took a while! Once it was all melted, it looked like liquid oil.

I thought about what a great lip gloss this would make- so i filled up a few wee tupperware containers I have.

As the finish solidifies over the next hour or so, make sure to stir it and scrape the outer edges and bottom. If you do not do this, the outside will be hard and you will have an inner oily area. 

While my finish was still a bit warm, I rubbed it all over the blocks. It felt SO good on my hands. (it also feels great on lips!) I applied the finish generously on the blocks and let them sit while I folded some laundry and finished the dishes.

Then I took two washcloths and wiped off the excess finish, followed by a secondary rub and wiping by another towel. With the waxy washcloths, I also rubbed my dining table- it looks great! 

As I finished each block, Rainbow Girl began to build.

Shortly thereafter, the blocks became stepping stones to get over the blue lake to avoid the mean purple alligators. Apparently Rainbow Girl was on a mission to save a nice pink shark that the alligators were mistreating.

Sugar Bear got in on the action.

"Cheese Mama!"

My finish consisted of 1/4 cup beeswax and 1 cup of coconut oil. I was able to wax all 25 blocks, make  three lip gloss cups, and wax my table with about 2 tablespoons left of the finish.