Cinnamon Ornaments

Oooo, look what I made!

 I have been seeing homemade cinnamon ornaments all over the Internet and I decided that I had to make some.  They are actually pretty simple.  I used the recipe from the McCormick website, which called for a 4.12 jar of McCormick's Ground Cinnamon and 3/4 cup of applesauce.  I decided to double the recipe, because I really had no idea how many ornaments a batch might make.
 

Just two ingredients, cinnamon and applesauce.



I poured the cinnamon in a mixing bowl and added the applesauce, then mixed them up.

 The recipe had warned that I would need to use my hands to get it mixed well.  They were right.

I'm not a fan of ick on my hands, so I donned some gloves.

And dug right in.

After a few minutes, this is what I had:


Lovely, isn't it?



The instructions called for putting a ball of dough between two layers of plastic wrap.  For a minute I thought I was in trouble.

Oops, end of the line.

Luckily, I found another package.

I rolled the dough out.

  Then came the fun part! 


I used a straw to make a hole to be able to hang them.

Ready to go in the oven.

 They bake low and slow, for two and a half hours in a 200 degree oven.

Since I had made a double batch, it only took half the dough to fill two cookie sheets.  I packaged the rest of the dough up in a plastic bag and put it in the fridge to do another time.

Two and a half hours later:

Unfortunately, I was not totally thrilled with how they came out.  The edges had curled up on them, so they looked a bit so-so.

 

 I went ahead and played with them a bit, trying out various hangers.

They were okay, but I wasn't satisfied.  Happily though, I still had half the dough left in the fridge.

This time I decided to make them thicker, to see if that would fix the curling problem.  I also used my finger to smooth out any rough edges.  When necessary, I dampened my finger a tiny, tiny bit to help smooth it.

I decided to use just the Christmas tree cookie
cutter.  It had seemed like one of the sturdier shapes.

I wondered if the first batch had overcooked a bit, so I shortened the baking time to just two hours  It seemed to do the trick!  Here they are laid out cooling:

Nine little non-curling trees.



Now that is the look I was going for!  I'm happy with them now. 

All ribboned up.

On a related note:  My house smells wonderful!

I'm linked up with:

Funky Junk Interiors' Saturday Night Special 109

Shabby Art Boutique: Inspiration Friday

Homemaker on a Dime's Creative Bloggers Party and Hop

Creating My Way to Success: A Round Tuit

2805's Potpourri Party

Debbiedoo's Newby Party

Nifty Thrifty Sunday

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