DIY Salt Dough Ornaments

December 02, 2013

DIY Salt Dough Ornaments

This is such a fun and easy project. And if you go by the true basics of DIY, using everything in your home only, it will be a free project. You can make these fancy and artful, or do what we did and have fun with your kids.

>>> Ingredients <<<

1/2 cup flour

1/2 cup salt

Up to 1/2 cup water

>>> Supplies <<<

Small cookie cutters or shapes of any kind [even a small cup will work for circles]

Crayons, markers, glitter glue or paints of any kind

String, bakers twine, ribbons or ornament hooks

Toothpick

>>> Note About Supplies <<<

Don’t worry about going out and buying a bunch of new stuff. If you don’t have cookie cutter shapes, grab anything you can use. My fave is shot glasses, champagne glasses or regular water glasses. Kids have tons of toys lying around you can use. Especially the play dough cutters. Use whatever you have. You can even freehand cut with a good knife. We happened to have glitter glue and 3 metallic markers, so we used those for the actual decorating. You can use crayons, markers, a sharpie, spray paint. Really, anything you want.

>>> Directions <<<

Mix together the salt and flour in a medium sized bowl.

Add half of the water and mix to start forming a dough. If it’s a little dry, add a little more water, until you get the perfect consistency. It should be exactly like sugar cookie dough, or pie crust. I suppose it’s even similar to biscuit dough.

Lightly spritz a baking sheet with non-stick cooking spray and preheat your oven to 250 degrees.

Sprinkle some flour out on the surface you want to use for rolling. Plop your dough out and roll to about 1/4 inch thick. At this point, I like to lift each side of the dough and sprinkle a little extra flour underneath to make sure it doesn’t stick and mess up my shapes when I’m trying to pick them up off the counter.

Cut your shapes! When you’ve cut all you can, knead the dough back up into a ball and re-roll, then cut more shapes, until you’re all out. Blow the extra flour off of each cut out and place it on the baking sheet. Depending on the size you’re cutting, you’ll end up with anywhere from 2 to 3 dozen ornaments.

Take a toothpick and round out a small hole in each ornament before you bake. This is really important because they are like durable glass. You won’t be able to make holes later. They won’t rise or change at all, so make the holes the exact size you need. Bake for 2 hours.