“It took me eleven years to get all 24 scents right. Now my wrists won’t let me pour a single one.” — Why a 68-year-old Vermont grandmother is letting her last handmade candle calendars go at a special price, before her scent notebook closes forever.

Thelma Penfield lifts a small glass jar to her nose and closes her eyes. “Balsam fir,” she says. “Number one. That one was easy.” Next to her on the kitchen table lies a spiral notebook with a cracked cover and 24 pages. One page for every scent.

Every page is full of her small, slanted handwriting. How much wax. How much oil. How hot. What went wrong. Some pages have been crossed out and started over a dozen times.

Thelma is 68. She lives in a white farmhouse from 1871 in Barnard, Vermont, a small town twelve miles north of Woodstock. For 31 winters she has poured candle calendars by hand, right here in her kitchen. 24 small candles in one box, and every single one smells different.

“Anybody can make one nice candle. Making 24 that each smell like a different piece of December, that took me most of my life.”

It started with 24 leftover jam jars

In 1995, Thelma began pouring candles at her stove and selling them at the small Christmas markets around Woodstock. One folding table, a thermos of coffee, a few dozen candles. The same friendly faces every December.

That first winter she tried out new scents in old jam jars. By December she had 24 of them, all different. She put them in a shoebox, wrote the numbers 1 to 24 on the lids and set the box on her market table. A woman from Quechee bought it that morning. The next year, she came back and asked for another one.

“I never planned it. I just had too many little test jars. But that woman came back, and the year after that she brought her sister.”

The kitchen where 3,100 calendars began

Thelma’s workshop is her kitchen. Two steel pitchers of wax sit warming on the old iron stove. A glass thermometer is clipped to the side. She pours at exactly 135 degrees. Any hotter and the wax sinks in the middle as it cools.

On the table, 24 small glass jars stand in three rows, every wick held straight by a wooden clothespin. The room smells of balsam fir, apple cider and gingerbread all at once.

Above the table hang the 24 little watercolors she painted in 1995. Every label since then is a print of one of them, cut out and pressed onto the glass by hand.

One calendar takes her about nine hours. Never more than about a hundred a year. In 31 years, more than 3,100 have left this kitchen, most of them to the same families, year after year.

What 31 winters taught her about a candle calendar

People who open one of Thelma’s calendars for the first time usually say the same thing: “They’re all different.” That was the whole idea.

• “The 24-Scent Library”: Every candle has its own scent and its own wax color. No scent comes twice, so every evening smells a little different. “If December 9th smells like December 3rd,” Thelma says, “you’ve stolen an evening from the children.”
• “The Painted-Original Labels”: Each little picture comes from one of the 24 watercolors Thelma painted in 1995. Santa, the snowman, the reindeer, the gingerbread house, “Let It Snow.” Children start picking favorites by the end of the first week.
• “The Clear-Glass Glow”: Every candle sits in a small, heavy jar of clear glass, just under two inches tall. You can see the color of the wax and the little flame through the glass. The flame stays inside the jar, right where it belongs on a table.
• “The Village Box”: All 24 candles come in a red box with a snowy village on the lid and 24 little numbered doors inside. Thelma mixes up the candles on purpose, so nobody knows which scent is waiting behind tomorrow’s door. And the box is already the gift wrap.

Eleven years for one single scent

Not every scent came easy. Her first cinnamon candle was so strong it made your eyes water. Peppermint faded in the jar after one week. Every mistake went into the notebook.

The hardest one was the candle with the little fireplace on it. Thelma wanted it to smell like a wood fire on Christmas Eve. Not like smoke. Like a warm room. It took her until 2006 to get it right.

“Eleven years I poured that one wrong. When I finally got it, I sat down at the table and cried a little. Then I wrote it down.”

That notebook is still the only place where the 24 recipes exist. Thelma never typed them up. Nobody else has ever poured a candle from it.

Ten pounds of wax on the kitchen floor

What Thelma will miss most are the quiet November afternoons. Snow at the window, wax warming on the stove, and the house slowly filling with 24 different smells.

In February of this year, a full pitcher slipped out of her hand. Ten pounds of hot wax ran across the kitchen floor. The doctor found arthritis in both of her wrists. It will not get better.

Pouring means holding a heavy pitcher perfectly still over a jar less than two inches wide. Twenty-four times for every calendar.

“I used to pour two hundred candles in one afternoon. Now my wrists tell me to stop after the fourth jar.”

Over the summer, before it got too bad, she poured her last batch from the notebook. Nobody will take over the kitchen. 186 calendars are left in the back room. After those, there will be no more.

“The same price as at my little table in Woodstock”

Her regular customers would gladly pay twice as much for the last calendars. She won’t ask for it. She wants them lit this December, not kept in somebody’s closet.

“I never charged more than at my little folding table in Woodstock. I’m not going to start with the last ones.”

Thelma does not own a computer, only a telephone with a cord on the kitchen wall. For 31 years, everything went through the Christmas markets and word of mouth. This year her daughter Willa came home for a Sunday, photographed the last calendars and set up the page where you can order now.

“Willa does the computer. I still pack every box myself. That much my wrists can do.”

What families say about Thelma’s candle calendar

• ★★★★★

  “My boys are 8 and 11 and they fight over whose turn it is to light the candle. That has never happened with a chocolate calendar.”

  Kathleen M., Concord, NH
• ★★★★★

  “Every candle really does smell different. Last night was peppermint, tonight something like cinnamon and orange. The little pictures are sweet, my granddaughter keeps the empty jars.”

  Donna R., Saratoga Springs, NY
• ★★★★★

  “I sent one to my daughter in Ohio, who has her first baby this year. She called me on December 1st with the first candle burning on her table. Best gift I’ve given in years.”

  Sharon T., Bangor, ME

Three questions people ask before ordering

Where can I buy one of Thelma’s candle calendars?

Only through this page. Thelma’s calendars are not sold on Amazon, Temu or in any store.

How long will they be available?

Only while supplies last. Thelma has poured her last batch, and there are 186 calendars left. When they are gone, there will be no more.

What if it’s not right for me?

You have 30 days to try it at home. If you are not happy, just send a short email and you will get your money back. No questions, no hassle.

More from families who light one every evening

• ★★★★★

  “The box is so pretty I didn’t want to open it. Every evening one of us opens a little door and we never know which candle is behind it. My husband guesses the scent with his eyes closed.”

  Janice W., Hartford, CT
• ★★★★★

  “Day nine was a pine and orange one I had never smelled in a candle before. I wish I could buy that one by itself. She really did make every evening different.”

  Theresa B., Worcester, MA
• ★★★★★

  “Ordered one for us and one for my sister. It arrived quickly and very well packed, not one jar broken. The little glass jars are heavier than I expected.”

  Ellen P., Portland, ME