Quick tabletop luminaries for Martinmas

These photos won't be the greatest quality, hubby took the last functioning camera in the house so I took some quick shots from my phone.

We had pressed some leaves for an going botany study with the two boys.  

First the boys took our collected leaves and sorted them by shape.  Above is some of the leftovers we had after the boys picked the leaves they wanted for the luminaries.  We had two varieties of oak, beech, three varieties of maple, aspen, tulip leaves and a few others that remain a mystery.  Christian matched the leaves using Trees Fandex Family Field Guide.  

I took some old flannel fabric to protect my ironing board and set out a sheet of wax paper.  The boys arranged their chosen leaves on the wax paper.

Another sheet of wax paper of the same length is placed on top of the leaves.  I placed another cloth over the wax paper and then ironed.  Aidan enjoyed helping with this task although he was disappointed that we didn't use the steam.  I used the highest setting with the steam option shut off.  I love the little wrinkles in the wax paper after ironing the layers together.   Don't worry about getting a totally smooth surface -  the wrinkles add a nice texture.

Trim the edges, bend the wax paper into a cylinder shape and glue the seam by overlapping the ends by about an inch.  I gathered a few things to put a small tealight candle on and fitted each luminary to the plate - we had two terra cotta pot saucers and then I used a couple of old teacup saucers.  I like the luminary that fits on the inside of the terra cotta saucer best - next time I would trim and glue the luminaries to fit that size.

With the recent time change...it is so dark...so early....these bring a bit of cheer and beauty.