Has anyone found a use for the leftover aluminum shells after tea-light candles have burnt out?
I have a lot of them saved up, seems a waste to throw them out in the recycling.

Wind chimes? Perhaps they would scare the birds off if you hung them in fruit trees?

I refill them. I use a nail and a thread spool to open up the little hole in the wick holder, insert a new wick, and refill the little tins.

I've used them as cookie cutters to make perfect little round sandwich cookies. We put fruit preserves in the middle.

I was reading in the ERE book (I think it was the book) that Crisco was originally intended as candle oil.

Seems like a really cheap and easy thing to do to refill the empties with Crisco and a wick and reuse them indefinately.

(I'm not claiming to have done this...but I can't see how it wouldn't work.)

Crisco was originally formed as a way to solidify oils for the purpose of making soap.
It burns quite well with a wick.