Making decorations with salt dough is a fun way to get the kids involved in the Christmas festivities. If your kids are too young to make decorations themselves, like Roman is, then you can press their hands or feet into the dough and cut them out. These make good keepsakes or gifts to give to the grandparents.
This recipe made enough for me to make 8 footprint ornaments and a pile of little Christmas trees. I would guess that you’d get about 11 of the footprint ornaments if that’s all you were making. Mine are 12cm wide.
Salt Dough
1 cup of table salt
About 1 cup lukewarm warm water
Mix the flour and salt together in a bowl. Make a well in the centre of the mix and pour in about 1/2 of the water. Use a knife to mix it all together.
Add the remaining water a spoon at a time until the dough comes together and is just pliable enough to knead. It should not be sticky. There may be some dry pieces in the bowl, but you can knead them into the ball.
Now knead the dough on a smooth surface. Dust with a little flour if needed. Knead for about 10 minutes. You really do need to knead it for 10 minutes so that is nice and soft and you remove any air bubbles.
Any rough edges can be tidied up with some sand paper or a nail file. You can leave them as is, or after they are totally dry, they can be painted with acrylic paints or sealed with some polyurethane or clear spray paint.
Anonymous says
Do you have any ideas for other shapes you can do without a cookie cutter? I want to make one fo my tree 🙂
thingsforboys says
The dough is pretty pliable, so you can shape it with your hands easily if you don’t have cookie cutters. You could roll out three sausages, plait them and make a wreath. Or roll out 2 sausages, twist them together and shape into candy canes. Make some holly leaves and berries. A circle for a snowmans face, with a carrot shaped nose on top. Hope those ideas get your creative juices flowing.
Jen says
I want to do this when I have a child. Thank you for sharing!
Ana says
Do you think that homemade paint would work well with the dough?
thingsforboys says
Hi Ana, I’m not sure. What is your paint made from? The dough is pretty dry and porous, so I would imagine most paints would work.
Anonymous says
my fault for not rolling it super thin, wanted to mold my son saying “i love you” in sign language (for my husband) so i needed it a bit thick to make sure all those little fingers were seen. anyway! it’s a little thicker than what you recommended, is it normal for it to have a little, i guess, “puff” in some places? what should i do about this? put paint on it and hope it dries or is it completely hopeless?
thingsforboys says
They will sometimes get puffy spots. You can’t get rid of them, so I’d say paint it and see. The lumps are just air bubbles, so it should still dry out ok.
Ashley Perrigin says
when baking, did you place them on a greased cookie sheet or just on the rack of the oven?
thingsforboys says
Hi Ashley, I used a cookie sheet lined with baking paper
Anonymous says
Do you think it would be safe to put dollar store stones in the dough before baking? For added decoration.
thingsforboys says
I think they should be fine, the oven temp is pretty low. I’d love to know how they turn out if you do!
Nicky says
My salt dough creations go soft after a few days as I live in a very humid climate. Any ideas how I can solve this problem??