Did you weigh the flour or just scoop it with a cup? That was my big mistake with my grandma's nut roll dough, scooping packs the flour down so you end up with way more than the recipe wants, and I fought that dough for two weekends before figuring it out. Now I fluff the flour with a fork, spoon it into the cup, and level it off, and the dough comes out right every time. Also worth checking if your mom's recipe was written when flour was milled differently, like beth said, because that really does change how much water you need.

Sherman-Williams on 5th never gets metallics right off the cap.

The Dollar Tree mold pooling weird is the exact problem I ran into, the wax never sits flat enough. Did you let the canvas cool flat or standing up after the hair dryer? I'm wondering if the cracking comes from the wax going on too thick in spots, maybe a thin second pass would help.