DIY Lollipop Crafts

As I mentioned in yesterday's post, I've been diligently working on my candy bar and all things pink, green, and metallic.  Despite having relatively low floral costs, I have decided not to put flowers on the candy table, but instead making "candy themed" decorations to liven up the table (a la Amy Atlas).

I recently decided to make two arrangements of giant lollipop-esque items after seeing these at the craft store:

As usual, I was inspired by all things sparkly and knew that I HAD to use them somewhere at the wedding. That amount of sparkle seemed best suited for the candy table. This is a fairly self explanatory project, but I do have a few notes/tips. 

First, here is a list of supplies that I used:

Although wine isn't on the list...I definitely needed a glass to complete this project

-Styrofoam balls for base (I used 2 different sizes for contrast, less work, and less supplies)
-Sparkly pom poms (any type of pom pom-like decoration should work)
-Dowel rods (to make the lollipop stick)
-Spray paint (to paint the lollipop stick)...buy it at your local Home Depot or Lowe's, I've already priced the spray paint at the craft stores and the home improvement store gives you 3X the paint at the same price.
-Wide wired ribbon (to tie bows at the base of the lollipop head, I'm using some from my pew bow hoard)
-Low heat hot glue gun (If you only have a high heat gun, I highly suggest you spend the $5 for the low heat version.  High heat will melt your styrofoam.)
-Large (like 100 pack) of hot glue sticks (you will need a ton, I also suggest you buy the kind that work with high heat and low heat glue guns...less worry later about which glue sticks are which)

Directions:

1. Spray paint your dowel rods outside to allow them time to dry.

2. I decided to use styrofoam balls as the base of the lollipop and hot glue the mess of them out of them using the sparkly pom poms as the "candy coating".  Place the balls close together to prevent gapping (you may have to hot glue a second layer of them at certain points to cover up any gaps).

 *Tip: Spray paint your styrofoam balls first with a similar/coordinating color...if I had done this I would have worried lest about the gaps.  Leave enough room blank for you to insert your dowel rod.  I also suggest you turn on a Real Housewives marathon because it can take awhile.



3.  Using dowel rod (after its dry), push into styrofoam ball. Remove the rod.  Pump some hot glue into the hole that the dowel rod left behind.  Put hot glue on the dowel rod.  Insert dowel rod back into sytrofoam ball, put some more hot glue around the outside of the dowel rod to seal it up, and let dry.

4.  Finish filling in blank space with sparkly pom poms.

5.  Cut length of ribbon long enough to make a good sized (but proportional!) bow.

6. Put a little hot glue on one side of the dowel rod and press ribbon onto the glue.

7. Tie bow.

8.  Admire your product!

All in all, it took me several nights to finish the lollipops (I made 2 large pink ones and 4 of the smaller green ones), mainly because I ran out of sparkly balls and had to hunt them down at several different Michael's (NoVA craft stores are NOT well stocked).  BUT it allowed Mr. 3 and I to spend a bunch of quality time together...as I watched Swamp Loggers and Sons of Guns with him while I hot glued my brains out...and all that lovely time spent in the car driving out to the burbs in search of supplies (BTW: Mr. 3 gets total credit for me accomplishing this project.  The sales people at Michael's were not helpful and he wandered around until he found the supplies.  He also held the ball for me so I could hot glue (all while working on some of his own IT projects)...he's quite the multi-tasker).

My main take away from this is...I now understand why pomander balls are so expensive to make (so time consuming!) and always buy more supplies than you think you will need!

What craft projects do you have going on?  Let us know and send us pictures!