Pretty!

I bet the pearls will be an improvement when you hang it on the tree. I'm not a Christmas person, but I've learned that more is more on a tree. I like the plain ones just in the picture, though.

Too easy? Is this make a bunch of ornaments at home night? A make and take event at the church? A kid project? For the first, it's great! Fast and pretty and probably smells great too, huh? For the second, there's really not much to do, so if they're mostly a bunch who are looking for an excuse to chat, maybe fine, but perhaps too simple if they want to learn a technique or something. For the kids, same thing. Great for fidgety ones, but maybe not as engaging for the ones who want to feel like they really did something.

I am having my 15th year of a Christmas Craft Night that I have with girlfriends. This year I invited 12 and expect about 10 of them. Usually we have one big craft and an ornament, but every five years it is all ornaments. Everyone brings an ornament with enough supplies for everyone to make one. It is a craft, eat, drink and be merry kind of night!

With nine other ornaments, why not do this one? It's pretty! They don't all have to be fiddly or hard. Maybe save it for when people are starting to get fatigued? Maybe around the halfway mark through the evening. I'm guessing it'll be a pretty boisterous activity. And people can munch on the broken mints. Are you doing all red? If you want to add to the clamor, you could get some other colors, as well. I think the biggest issue will be keeping straight whose is whose, but since you're all friends, I don't think it matters much, right? Or maybe have a food dye pen to mark names on the forms?

I think it would be fun to spot one of these on a tree, too, and then realize it's made of candy.

Cute.! I'll bet you could do them in a Christmas tree shape cookie cutter adding silver balls to green candies.

If I do this ornament I am going to buy star, ornament and Christmas tree cookie cutters. I'm going to experiment a little more with beads and stuff. Thanks for the idea. I guess I need to see if there are other colors of these candies too.

Could you decorate a tree one with those teeny tiny jingle bells? Could you find the green and white mints for trees? Rhinestones would sparkle more than pearls on the tree. I would also develop a hangar that is gooey too.

I think they're pretty! Curious about if they are sticky?

Me, too!

We did this one year with Jolly Ranchers. It looks like stained glass. The hardest part was making the hole to hang it.

Those are really pretty without any added decorations. If you made holes all around the edge, you could lace them with thin satin ribbon or metallic cord, and then use a loop of the ribbon/cord for a hanger.

I saw something similar on a blog--they made serving trays with the mints, using a lined cooky sheet.

What a fun thing to do with those awful mints that seem to always find their way to the bottom of your purse, covered in lint. They're cute.

Last night they were not sticky, today they are a little sticky. I found this ornament on Pinterest and the blogger added a readers comment that she tried 8 different sealers and found that she liked Royal Coat Finishes-High Gloss Finish Spray. I'm going to see how sticky they feel in a day or two to decide if I want to buy the spray.

I made the holes too soon and they just melted back together. I waited a bit longer and kept watch over it and had to stick my toothpick in there a few more times.

There are are several different crafts on Pinterest with these mints.

I think when we made our holes, we used a straw. I cut straws into about 2" sections to make it easier. I can't remember why. The hardest part was making the hole while it was still hot enough. I remember something about clear coating, but I think i threw the ornaments out instead or the kids ate them. I keep Christmas ornaments in the attic and anything kept in there during the summer is going to get hot and melt although that may not be an issue for where you live. We were having summer temps in the 105-112 degree range then.

Jewels, hard candy is hydrophilic...it will only get stickier and softer when exposed to the air. I think that sealing the ornaments is a must.

There's a craft ornament similar to this but not using candy. By similar I mean the final result looks similar. For it use the plastic lids from like a sour cream container or something similar, round with a little depth. Using elmers clear glue and those round colored glass vase fillers, they look like flattened glass marbles, you fill out the inside of the lid with as many of the glass things as will lay flat, then you squirt in as much of the clear glue as possible - allow it to settle and you may need more. Leave it alone for a day to completely dry. Peel off the plastic lid. You can drill a little hole with a drimmel tool or insert a small section of a straw in between the glass beads before adding the glue. I have the directions and some pictures somewhere. The glue comes out clear and all you see are the pretty colors like stained glass.

I really like the look of the mints in the picture but I would be very afraid of them attracting bugs and ants plus the sticky factor. When I put little candy canes on the tree l leave the plastic wrapper on.

This is very similar to the guide I had.

Tutorial

Ornament with glass gems

"They" always says that ants aren't a problem in colder weather, but one year when we did strings of popcorn and cranberries for the tree, they were covered with ants a couple days later. So, with decorations made from candy, I'd be worried about ants. Spraying them to seal them would be mandatory, in my book.

Jewels, have you ever done the clear glass ball ornaments with the popped popcorn inside? I thought that was one of the cutest ornaments I ever got at the ornament exchange party that I go to. The person who made them put about 20 popcorn kernels in each ball and left the top off and microwaved them one at a time. Then she shook out the unpopped ones and tucked in a sprig of greenery and a few red berries, all fake but nice. Then she put the top back on and tied a little ribbon to the top and it was just the cutest little ornament ever. She had a few of the glass ornaments break in the microwave so you would need to have a few extras on hand just in case.

We had ants one winter in our Michigan home! Someone had given us some pastries that they made and had powdered sugar on them. We were gone for the day and they were sitting on the kitchen counter. Ants made a bee line to them. To this day don't know where the ants came from, possible the tree???

Xmas trees are famous for harboring critters of all kinds! Certainly insects of many kinds; praying mantids are common hitchhikers. Once they warm up in the house, they hatch!