I love ornaments. L.O.V.E. them. But I have rules when it comes to my ornaments. They must have some kind of meaning behind them. So this year I thought it would be fun and
memorable to make our own ornaments from salt dough.
Little K was pumped!
She is my mess-maker after all, so mixing up a batch of salt dough was perfect for her.
I'm picky about my dough however. I've made batches before that were too salty, and you could see the granules. That would simply not work for this professional-level project. I wanted smooth dough.
This is smoother. Not clay, but it's not granular.
- 4 cups white all-purpose flour
- 1 cup salt
- 1-1/2 cups hot (hottest tap) water
Dissolve the salt a little in the hot water, then mix in the flour. That makes a nice dough that is very easy to handle.
Roll the dough to about 1/4 inch thick. Transfer cut ornament shapes to a cookie sheet. Poke a hole in the top of the ornament for hanging after they've dried and been painted.
Bake the ornaments at 325 degrees until they are hard. This will usually take 30-40 minutes, depending on how thick they are.
Finally, we got a dough we like, and less ninja photos...
After you've made your dough, flour the surface so the dough doesn't stick.
Grab a ball of dough and start mushing it flat.
When that doesn't work, grab your rolling pin...
If your rolling pin doesn't already have flour on it, you'll need it. Otherwise, the dough sticks.
Just sprinkle a little bit on...
Or a lot...
Continue to roll out flat.
Once your dough is about 1/4" thick, grab your cookie cutter...
Press it in...
Might as well fill up the space...
Very carefully remove your cutouts...
Any shape can be cut out, carved out, painted on. We use cookie cutters and playdoh cut outs!
Put the cutouts on a baking sheet and poke a hole for hanging. We used a toothpick.
We cooked ours at 200 degrees for 2 hours but some ornaments were still damp. If you can make these a few days ahead of time, even better.
Once they're dried (enough to paint), paint away. Acrylics work best. Then, once the paint dries, give them a glaze. You can find this in the paint section of your craft store. It seals the paint and gives a nice gloss finish.
We made alot of ornaments....
Okay, so I might have gotten a little caught up in the action. I have to tell you though, painting these ornaments was the most relaxing thing I did all weekend. Seriously.
In any case, my dilemma now is getting rid of the truly grotesque ornaments they made without them realizing it. I mean they each made at least a dozen. Not putting all that on my tree!
We'll see...
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