Magrietha;
It sounds to me like your thermometer is innacurate. Your working temperature should be around 31 or 32 degrees.
Check your thermometer's high and low temperatures.
High temperature test: boil some water and take the temperature. Adjust your boling point approximately 1.5 degrees celcius for every thousand feet above sea level. (for example, your boiling point of water at 3,000 feet above sea level will be approximately 95.5 degrees C)
Low temperature test: fill a small bowl with as much ice as possible, then fill the rest of it with water. Stir and insert your thermometer. It should read very close to zero.
You need to test both ends because the way that thermometers work doesn't mean they are accurate at all points along the range they measure.
You will also find that highhumidity will require you to raise the "bottom" temperature of your tempering cycle a degree or so on occasion. Chocolate is very hygroscopic, meaning it very easily absorbs water and odor from its surroundings. Water causes chocolate to get very thick, and will cause you grief if you don't make the necessary adjustments.
No offence to Debra, but I personally wouldn't recommend that you add cocoa butter to your chocolate to thin it. Not only does that dilute the chocolate, dull the flavor, and change the viscosity of the chocolate, but it is a quick band aide fix whichin the longrun adds to your problems (after all it's the cocoa butter in the chocolate which is causingyou the problems in the first place. It doesn't really make sense to pour more gasoline on to that fire!). Understanding how thecocoa butter crystals behave, is the KEY to temperingand working with chocolate.
One other thing: When reheating your chocolate, take it off the heat source when it's a couple of degrees below your target (especially for small batches done in a baine marie). The heat of the pot will carry the temperature up, sometimes as much as 4 degrees, hence if you take the chocolate off your heat source AT your target temperature, within moments it will again be out of temper and you have to start over.
Hope that helps.
Brad.