Did you know that you can bend and shape candy canes?
Seriously!
The candy cane, usually so hard and brittle, becomes soft and bendable after just a few minutes in the oven.
Maia and her friend Ava played around with this idea after school yesterday and had so much fun with it.
They started out by taking the plastic wrapper off the candy canes and placing them on a parchment-paper covered cookie sheet.
Then I popped them in a 250F oven fro 10 minutes. They should look like this (above)—slightly puffy but still holding their shape (although that very top one has been bent already).
If you forget about the candy canes in the oven while a child is being picked up and you’re chatting with a parent, your candy canes will look like this. Interesting, but a little more tricky to manipulate for bendy purposes.
At first, Maia and Ava were unsure about the candy cane project.
But they quickly got into it. Maia bent them with her hands (they weren’t that hot)…
While Ava used chopsticks to shape her candy cane.
They made hearts, wreaths, twists…
…letters…
…and spirals.
This is seriously addictive! We’re already planning to do it again with a variety of candy canes—small ones, big ones, even different colors.
I highly recommend giving this a try and bending some candy canes with your kids! It’s so easy and quick, yet super satisfying.
Besides, what else are you going to do with all those candy canes?
Update: Check out this awesome candy cane garland that Laurie from Frosting and a Smile made for her tree using this method. Thanks to Meg for sharing the link!
