Have you heard of “Mod Podge Mod Melts by Plaid?”Well if you haven’t, it’sa relatively new craft product on the market in which you can use in your hot gluegun to fill molds with.Do you want to hear a Secret? They are almostidentical to using hot glue gunsticks! We didn’t think it would be fair to not tell you that hot glue works just asgood! If not better!So why is this Big News? Because Hot Glue is cheaper, and our molds workas well as the Mod Melt Brand, plus we have a LOT more to choose from! Wehave 1,000 molds to choose from. Don’t make what everyone else is making,create something that’s unique.Let’s get started!FILLING MOLDSFirst things first:•Both our flexible and hard molds work with Mod Melts or Hot Glue.•Both Mod Melts or Hot Glue can be used with these instructions.Gather supplies:•Get your molds out!•Cooking spray oil•Hot glue gun* (plug it in)•Mod Melts or...•High temp glue sticks (colored orclear)*Make sure you use a hot glue gun, because you will need the extra cooling timeto fill your molds. If you use glue sticks instead of Mod Melts there’s no need toclean out your gun to use it with a new product.Step-by-Step:1.Spray your molds with cooking spray.2.Heat your glue gun is as hot as it gets.3.Squeeze into your molds filling each mold cavity.Be careful to try to getthe glue into all of the crevices, and try not to overfill the molds. Theexcess Mod Melt around the shapes can be trimmed with a craft knife orsharp pointed scissors, and can be avoided by filling the mold a little lessgenerously.4.Let dry for 5 to10 minutes and then pop them out with the tip of a knife oryour fingernail.Remove all traces of the non-stick spray oil before painting. The finishedembellishment can be finished with FolkArt acrylic paints, shimmer mists, alcoholinks, glitter, metallic paints, pearl paint and even embossing powders. You couldeven leave them white or clear by not painting them at all.Good Tip: By first painting the embellishment a solid color, and then pouncing ordry brushing over the base color with another color helps highlight the details ofyour finished pieces.What adds to the appeal of making your own embellishments is being able toinsert a string, pin-backs, bobby pin, or other feature into the embellishmentbefore it hardens so that it dries around the feature to become a solid piece. Youcould add jump rings or a bezel into the back of the castings to make quickjewelry as well.Our take on Hot Glue vs Mod MeltsHere’s our experience using Mod Melts products to make resin-styleembellishments and how to make your very own knock-off versions using hot glueinstead for a fraction of the price!So what are Mod Melts? They aremade by Plaid (the makers of ModPodge) Mod Melts are meltable sticksto use in your hot glue gun and meltinto small sized molds. These makeresin-style embellishments for to use invarious crafts, scrapbooking, jewelry,hair accessories, etc.I was really intrigued by them -especially because you could paintthem using a variety of finishes tomake them custom colored, metallic, glittery, etc. No more buying bigassortments of resin shapes just to get a few in a certain color or shape. And justmaking what you need, when you need it, sounded good. The concept was pretty simple. Just heat a stick in a high temp glue gun andtrigger the melted goo into the molds. After 10 minutes they're hardened andready to paint. I learned you have to work super fast - the stuff sets in seconds,so it's a bit tricky to get into the little crevices in the detailed shapes and to avoidair bubbles. Opposite to the directions (that said to start in the middle), I startedin the nooks and crannies after a few dud results. They started turning out better, but I noticed I went through a lot of the materialpretty quick. 16 mini sticks cost about $6.99. 4 sticks made about 2 dozenpieces, but not all turned out usable.The big surprise for me was that they weren't super hard like resin shapes, morerubbery, like dried hot glue. And that got me thinking... why not try that? So I did. And guess what? It worked just as well, if not better. I just used myhigh temperature sticks & glue gun. The glue took a little longer to start to set, soit was easier to fill in the shapes and knock out any air bubbles. It also didn't takea full 10 minutes before it could be popped out - I did in about 5 minutes, so Icould get to painting right away.And they painted up great - I actually noticed the paint coverage seemed betteron the hot glue shapes.I also noticed painting with many coats and usingtextures like glitter helped hide imperfections on both theMelts & glue varieties.The point of being able to make your own customembellishments seems kind of negated when everyoneis using the same 4 molds, so using our molds seemslike a no-brainer. The results were just as good with theglue. Just be sure to use cooking oil before filling hardmolds with glue.Price-wise, the regular glue sticks work out to be about1/4 of the cost or less, so I can go crazy makingembellishments and still keep it cheap. I thought thislittle discovery was worth sharing, so you can save too!The finished Mod Melts could be added to favors, napkinrings, cards, thank-you notes, and party decor, giving avery professional and cohesive look on a budget.