Hoping for a fresh new year 

December, oh, December.

Time for holidays, parties, cocktails and the red holiday cups at Starbucks (I get excited about small things, what can I say). It’s also deemed a time for reflection as the birth of a new year is upon us. What is it about the expectations of the arrival of Jan. 1 that just feels ... fresh. It’s an opportunity for a clean slate – everyone is making resolutions about getting fit, taking that trip, working less, enjoying more.

None of those things apply to December, however. Work! Run! Spend! Exhaust yourself!

I’m here to help with at least one thing to make the holidays easier. With the heavy commercialism and shopping frenzy that happens this time of year, I found a project that’s cheap, easy and can turn out well ... if you’re not me.

Here’s one last attempt for this year – my holiday gift to you. This is an opportunity to make something that you can use at your holiday party, or give as a cool, homemade gift, or if you’re like me, have a much larger mint than the 40 small ones with which you started.

I have a Pinterest board called “Tis The Season” that over the years I have filled up with food, drinks, decorations and projects for this time of year. I finally decided that this was the time to make the Starlight Mint Serving Platter I have been curious about for quite a while. This, by far, was the least expensive project I have done to date from Pinterest. All you need is a bag of Starlight Mints, parchment paper, a cookie sheet and your oven. I already had the parchment paper, and the mints were only $1.30 at Walgreens. It is good they were so cheap. I did multiple runs and didn’t have much luck.

The hardest part about this project is unwrapping the mints. I used 40 mints each time, but depending on what size you want your tray to be, it could be more or less. The first “tray” I made, I pulled out a piece of parchment paper the length of the cookie sheet. I then arranged my mints into a rectangle (yes, it was originally a rectangle) on the paper. You want to set the mints relatively close together so that they will meet when they melt. Once you have your design laid out, carefully place them in the oven. I bumped the tray and had to fix the arrangement. Bake this at 350 for about 8 to 9 minutes.

What came out of my oven was successfully melted together, but it was pretty wonky in shape – the pictures on the pin showed one coming out of the oven with perfect edges. I thought it was messed up because I had too much parchment paper, and perhaps it pulled up, wasn’t flat, and caused the weird shape. For Round 2, I used a smaller piece of paper that would stay flat and wouldn’t pull the candy into an odd shape. Yet, somehow, it managed to do it all on its own anyway.

I gave up. Not only was mine just basically a glob, it was also bubbly. Later, I discovered other pins that suggested baking them in a round pan or using a pizza cutter to make clean edges when it comes out of the oven. You can also cut the slab with a cookie cutter to make festive, miniature trays. The end result is very thin, no matter what you choose to do design-wise and would probably only be good for one use if yours turned out right. It would be cute for a work party or, of course, one at your house, and then after you use it, you could take an ice pick to it and freshen your breath post-dinner. I’m pretty sure that’s what I’m going to do with mine.

It’s coming up on a year that I’ve had the pleasure to do this column, and in the spirit of the season, I spent some time looking back on all the projects that have been completed. I started out last year as a non-crafty hack, someone whose best efforts in the kitchen might produce a fragrant pot of burnt Ricea-Roni. I never thought I would make so much stuff. Granted, some failed miserably, but there are a few things I’m pretty proud to say I made. It’s been a good year, and I promise to keep trying to make your lives a little more crafty, with the understanding that it won’t always be pretty. That’s a resolution I know I can keep.