Balls and beans

I went through a phase some years ago, of making Christmas ornaments from unexpected materials. Behold, the mung bean balls. They were such a pretty colour, but 5 years and the less than delicate handling of two small boys means that they are unlikely to be gracing my mantle in the future.

Another not-to-be-repeated Christmas decoration was the sprout tree. This was a cone shaped topiary made from individually wired brussel sprouts. It looked great, but after 3 days in a heated house, it smelled awful. Sadly, this was in pre-digital days, so I have no photo to show you. Perhaps that's a good thing - I wouldn't recommend it as something to try.

And how about these:

from a book called Vyrobky z pirodnich materialu. I have no idea what that means, but the book is full of strange objects made from seeds, conkers, nuts and corks. I have a whole series of these Polish (I think) craft books and I think they need to get out a bit more, so if you (or your kids) would get a giggle out of this, leave me a comment. If there are stampeding hoards of you, I'll draw names, but somehow I think it's unlikely.