Candy Cane Crafts

Ok, so we are a little under a week away until Christmas. Up this week we have a Christmas favourite, the candy cane! We have some fun candy cane crafts for you but first a little history on this yummy sweet treat.

The candy cane first originated in Cologne, Germany when a choirmaster at a cathedral wanted all the children there to be quiet during a Christmas Eve ceremony. He asked a local candy maker to create a treat for these children to help them stay quiet and he came up with the candy cane. Candy canes are typically white with red stripes and have a peppermint flavour but now you’ll see all sorts of flavours and colourings. The first candy canes were made by hand and eventually a Chicago based company patented the candy cane shape in the early 1920’s and machines started making them.

We’re not making candy canes this week in a cooking sense; we are making them in a craft sense.

Check out the two fun and easy Christmas candy cane crafts that we tried out...

Twine Wrapped Candy Canes

These are super easy.

All you need is a candy cane or two (depends on how many of these decorations you want to make) some twine, hot glue, and ribbon.

Start by gluing the bottom of the candy cane and start wrapping with twine. Periodically put some glue on the candy cane as you wrap it. Eventually you’ll have a fully twine wrapped candy cane.

Add a twine or ribbon bow to the top along with a twine hoop for hanging.

Paper Candy Canes

This is another fun and simple craft.

For this one you’ll need markers, paper, a ruler, scissors, and tape.

First thing you’ll need to do is cut the paper into a square.

Then draw lines around two edges in varying widths and colours. Most we did were four to five lines or you can do three to six. We used a ruler as we wanted straighter lines.

Next turn the paper over and starting on the corner with no lines, start to roll the paper.

Once it’s all rolled up, tape the last corner down. You’ll have a candy stick now.

To turn it onto a candy cane, while flattening as you go, curl over one end with your finger or a fatter marker and manipulate it to a hook end.

Trim the end of the curled end.

Hang them up or display them through your house for the holidays!

DIY Paper Basket

With Spring in full gear now we are going to share with you a little how-to Spring/Easter basket that you can make. These are perfect to use as an afternoon craft project with the kids on Spring Break so they can have them ready for egg collecting on Easter morning or you can use them as decorations or even as a goodie “bag” at a party or gift basket to give to someone. They can be as cute or as sophisticated as you want them to be.

Here’s how to make them...

We actually made two different sized baskets. The first one (blue) is made from regular sized paper that we cut into a 8 ¼ x 8 ¼ inch square. You can really use any size paper but it needs to be cut into a square. The bigger the paper the bigger the basket. We also made one (pink) that was slightly larger so we made that a 12x12 inch square. We have also provided lots of step by step by step pictures as some of the steps are hard to explain.

So the process at the start is the same for any size. You will need to start off with a square then you mark it into thirds in both directions so you end up with nine smaller equal squares.

Then you cut the two lines on the bottom third and the two lines on the top third (as shown in the picture below).

Now fold all the side towards the middle along the lines.

Here’s where things get a little different.

Blue Basket (wider shallower basket): Put glue on the sides of the bottom middle square and then glue the bottom corner squares to the middle so it forms a triangle. Repeat at the top.

Then use scissors to round the four corners of the basket.

Take a long thin strip (ours is from what was left over of the paper that we made into a square which was about 8 ½ inches long but you can make yours whatever size you like) and glue the strip on like a handle.

Now you can decorate. We used some punches but you can draw, stamp, or sticker things to it. Keep in mind that stamping and drawing would be more difficult when the basket is already assembled.

Pink Basket (taller deep basket): Take each corner and spilt into thirds again and cut. 

Now take the middle bottom square and mark the middle of the edge and cut into a triangle and do the same on the other side. Fold along lines. 

Glue the inner third from the right hand side to the inner third from the left hand side so they are perpendicular to each other.

Then continue overlapping and gluing sides, adding thirds and alternating sides until you’ve used them all.

The last ones should be in line with each other.

Glue the remaining triangles upward to hide all of the overlapping gluing that you’ve just done and probably to hold things in place as well.

Fold little one inch circles (ours probably could have been a little bigger) to help hide all of the edges and corners at the top

Attach a handle. Again it can be whatever size and colour you choose. Lastly, decorate!