Supplies Needed
Pool NoodleRed and White Stripe Wrapping Paper
Yard Stick Black Marker or Sharpie Knife or Box Cutter Scissors Thick Plastic Wrap Double Sided Tape Decorative Ribbon
Step by Step Instructions
Step one, take a yard stick and lay it on your work surface. Take a pool noodle and lay it beside the yard stick. Count up to three inches and then use a black marker to mark the measurements on the noodle. Keep going until your at the end of the noodle. (Note, for testing purposes, you can test a length and see if it is too big or too little for you before you start completely sectioning off the noodle. Don't worry if you have already marked up your noodle with one length but find out that you desire another length. Just remeasure the length on the Noodle and perhaps make the marks dark so you can differenciate the markings. If you have a different color marker, you can also use this to show the new desired length. The markings on the noodle will never be seen because you 're going to wrap the noodle in peppermint striped wrapping paper or whatever type of warping paper you would like.) Once the noodle is measured to the desired length, use a knife or a box cutter to cut the noodle at the markings to separate the noodle into individual pieces. Second, take one of the pieces of noodle you cut and start rolling it in the desired gift wrapping paper until all of the noodle is covered. Once you completely covered the noodle in wrapping paper, unroll the the piece of noodle from the paper and then take a marker and make a line inside the top of the paper to show where the paper completed the wrapping of the noodle piece. Once the line is made, you will then fold the wrapping paper along the line. Take the thick plastic and put it underneath the wrapping paper and cut both the wrapping paper and the thick plastic at the same time. Use the fold you made in the wrapping paper as your guide. By cutting both, you will have the same measurement for both the wrapping paper and plastic. This will make it easier to create the finished candy. Third, take the wrapping paper and put a ruler inside of it. Using the ruler, take the foam piece and place it a little past the two inch mark on the ruler. You only need to make this mark at bottom of the noodle towards the inner most part of the wrapping paper. Then take the noodle and the ruler and put them aside and fold the paper at the mark. Take the scissor and cut along the fold. Take one of the uncut edges and make a fold inward about an inch. Then place a strip of double sided tape the measurement of the fold on you just made and lay it on the folded edge. Take the pre-cut pool noodle and put it on the unfolded edge of the paper and roll it inwards toward the direction of the double sided tape edge. Next, neatly fold the open top inward and then do the bottom the same way. Tape both ends so they stay closed. Fourth, using the pre-cut plastic wrap, lay it out on your work station. Then use the piece of noodle you just folded into the wrapping paper and lay on top of the pre-cut plastic warp. Make sure that the plastic wrap extends three inches past each end of the foam noodle. If it is not at least three inches, it may not be long enough to wrap the noodle in. Do not use a marker to mark on the plastic wrap because it can be seen. So take the plastic wrap at one end and fold it in half and then cut then it at the fold. Now take about a two or three inch piece of double sided tape place it at the edge of one sides of the plastic wrap. Take the noodle rolled into wrapping paper and place it at the tape free edge of the plastic wrap and roll it inwards in the plastic until you meet the double sided tape. Next, twist the plastic at both ends of the pool noodle. Taking the decorative ribbon cut a length of maybe five inches. You can cut it longer and then cut it down later to adjust it to the desired length. Once the ribbon is cut, tie it into a bow at the one of the ends. Then repeat on the other end. Finally, repeat the steps above until you have as many pieces made as you would like. Then use the pieces to decorate. You can lay a piece next to a bowl of candy or by display the decorations by themselves.This is a child friendly project. I think a child of at least nine easily make these however, you will be required to cut the noodle unless the child is old enough to handle a knife. The added bonus is that this project is inexpensive, simple, with virtually no clean up necessary.