Orange clove pomander

I first made these lovelies years ago, before children, when I was working at Laura Ashley:

I think pomanders might be an English sort of craft - not something we do a lot of here in the US.  I love how simple and fragrant they are.  And so pretty!

I started with a leftover orange from Thanksgiving, an old container of cloves, some pretty ribbon, and a nut pick (for hard-to-poke holes) I think the whole thing took about 10 minutes, as I sat at the kitchen table with Scout in the morning.

I positioned the ribbon where I wanted it on the orange and secured it with a clove, then used it as my guide to start lining up the cloves.

 I tied off the ribbon and just kept poking in the cloves; they went in pretty easily.

When I thought it was filled in enough, I stopped.  I ended up using all of the cloves I had - about 1/2 the small jar.  We had these cloves leftover from last Christmas, so they were smelly enough for decorating, not quite enough for mulled cider.

Found a nice place for it to perch on a bookshelf and left it to dry and scent the area.  Some recipes I have used call for rolling it in powdered  orris root.  I think that speeds the drying process is all.  But I have made them with and without that method.  As long as it's not too humid, they should be fine without it.  It was fun to sit calmly and make a pretty Christmas craft while chatting with my son about his day.  Whatcha think?  Done any aromatic Christmas crafts lately?

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Shanty 2 Chic's Christmas Craft Linky Pasrty