An article for those who like to engage in creativity with a child. It contains recipes for salt dough for modeling and many ideas for crafts.
Modeling is a fun and useful activity at the same time. Making figurines, paintings, compositions from plastic material, the child develops imagination, logical thinking, fine motor skills, and learns perseverance.
Of course, a mother can simply buy plasticine or some branded mass for modeling for a baby. But how high quality and environmentally friendly these materials are? Alternatively, you can use salt dough made with my own hands from inexpensive natural products.
How to make dough for crafts?
Ecological cleanliness is not the only advantage of salt dough over plasticine or play-doh.
- The recipe according to which the plastic mass is prepared does not cause any difficulties for absolutely anyone. If a child asks to sculpt while in the country, for example, and there is no plasticine at hand, it will be possible to fulfill his desire in half an hour
- Modeling materials in the store are quite expensive. Salt dough ingredients are much cheaper
- Salty dough, even the one in which paint was added does not stain hands, does not stick to fingers. It is soft and pliable
- Dough crafts can be dried using a special technology. Then they will be stored for a long time and serve as a souvenir, Christmas tree toy, children's toy.
IMPORTANT: Even in ancient times, people mastered modeling from dough with salt. A whole art arose, which was called testoplasty. The women and children made very fine crafts, hand-painted them and used them as home decorations. Figurines, symbolizing various benefits, were considered expensive gifts, presented only to close people. Our ancestors did not “wrap up” with a salt dough recipe, making the material only from water, flour and salt.
Today, salt dough modeling, which has suddenly returned to popularity, is called bioceramics. The recipes for the dough itself are being improved. Unfortunately, some of them involve the use of wallpaper paste, synthetic paints, etc. The concept of absolute naturalness is lost.
There are three main components in the composition of salt dough for modeling. It:
Additionally widely used:
- gelatin
- starch
- vegetable oil
- natural dyes (beet juice, green beans, etc.)
- food colorings
- gouache or watercolor paints
- PVA glue
- wallpaper glue
Glue or starch makes the finished dried dough figures more durable, but it is not advisable to add them to the material that is intended for children under 5 years old. And dough with butter can be greasy and stain clothes.
IMPORTANT: You can color both the dough itself while it is being prepared, and the finished figure, then creativity will be more interesting and doubly useful
RECIPE #1. simple dough
Needed: wheat flour - 1 cup, extra salt - 1 cup, cold water - 0.5 cup
First of all, dry ingredients, flour and salt will be combined. If the dough is colored food coloring or paint, I dissolve them in water. Gradually adding colored water to the flour and salt, knead a rather steep dough, but such that it does not stick to your hands and does not crumble into crumbs.
IMPORTANT: To check if the mass is suitable for modeling, a smooth ball is rolled out of it, a hole is pressed through the middle of it with a finger. The dough should neither spread nor momentarily return shape. The edges of the recess must remain even.
RECIPE #2. dough with starch
You need: wheat flour - 0.5 cups, starch - 0.5 cups, extra salt - 1 cup, water - 0.5 cups.
Just as in the first case, flour, salt and starch are first mixed. Next, gradually add clean or tinted cold water. The mass for modeling, which contains starch, becomes more elastic.
In addition to the most salty modeling dough, you need to prepare:
- plank
- knives - stacks
- molds (such, for example, come with the play-doh test)
- beads, sequins, buttons, other improvised materials for decorating crafts
IMPORTANT: Flour and salt dough can be used several times in a row. To avoid it drying out, the material is placed in a plastic bag or wrapped in cling film then sealed in an airtight container and placed in the refrigerator
How to dry dough crafts?
If the dough crafts are small, they will dry on their own. To prevent cracks from appearing on their surface, they are removed from direct sunlight.
You can also dry the figures from the dough in the oven with a minimum temperature and always with the door ajar. In the oven, the dough is dried for 3 - 6 hours, depending on the size of the craft. She goes to the oven three times for 1 - 2 hours, between each time there is a short break.
Making salt dough with children
For the first time, you can offer salt dough to a baby as early as the age of 1 year. This is not chemical plasticine or play-doh mass, the mother may not worry if the baby tastes the material or swallows it. For such small "home-made" dough is prepared without synthetic dyes.
IMPORTANT: Modeling dough is very salty. As a rule, it is enough for a child to lick it to understand that it is not edible. But if the baby still ate a piece, you just need to give him plenty of drink, and if mom is still worried, and a bag of Smecta
Full-fledged developmental modeling classes are possible with children from 2 years old. From rolling circles and balls out of salt dough, they will smoothly turn into real creativity, in which kids will be able to mold flowers, animals, favorite fairy-tale and cartoon characters, and more.
The final result of modeling from dough is as important for kids as the process itself. The finished craft causes them strong positive emotions.
Dough crafts for children in kindergarten
No need to think that salt dough is a “handicraft” material exclusively for homework. teachers kindergarten have long taken note of the recipes for plastic material and are happy to replace plasticine with them in developing classes with pupils.
So, in nurseries, casts of babies' hands, circles, mushrooms, "sausages", snails, etc. are often molded. In older groups, children are already poring over themed crafts, for example, for the holidays.
Dough crafts for kids. Step-by-step dough crafts
When sculpting from dough with kids, you don’t need to come up with ideas for crafts: usually, they are born by themselves at the moment when the fingers touch the plastic material. Children love to sculpt
- geometric figures
- flowers and trees
- fruits and vegetables
- animals
- dinosaurs
- little men
- fairy creatures
- cartoon characters
Adults, mastering testoplasty, can get ideas on the Internet, there are many step by step wizard classes.
IMPORTANT: Good benefits for both children and beginner adults are the books “Salty Dough Step by Step” by V. Khomenko and “Miracles from Salt Dough” by A. Firsova
Templates for crafts from the test. Children's crafts from salt dough
Salt dough crafts can be very beautiful. Children's crafts have their touching charm. Adults are like pottery.
To get inspired for creativity, you can view a selection of thematic photos with crafts from salt dough.
Salt dough panels and pictures
Such works of bioceramic art can be hung on the wall or placed in a conspicuous place. Salt dough photo frames are also very beautiful.
New Year's crafts from salt dough
On the New Year from the test you can mold not only Christmas decorations, but also gifts - souvenirs for friends in the form of a symbol of the year. In 2016, this is a funny monkey.
Crafts from the test for February 14 for Valentine's Day. Crafts from salt dough heart
The heart is the symbol of Valentine's Day. Made with your own hands from flour, salt, water and, of course, love, it will turn into a very valuable gift.
A cute angel made of salt dough also looks very nice.
Video: Angel on February 14
Crafts from the dough by February 23. Salt dough craft
On February 23, instead of a banal postcard, you can give men cute crafts from dough: the number 23, any symbols of courage, for example, weapons, cars, military equipment.
Crafts from the test for March 8. We make flowers from salt dough. Dough rose craft
Any mother will be touched by a craft given to her by her beloved child for the holiday of March 8. Most often these are flowers, bouquets, flower arrangements. Dough roses will never wither.
Gorgeous basket of flowers.
Video master - a class on making roses from salt dough
Crafts from dough for Shrovetide. Easter crafts from salt dough
Stand - chicken for Easter eggs.
Easter crafts made from salt dough will bring a special flavor to the bright holiday
Salt Dough Crafts Animals
From salt dough together with the baby you can fashion a whole zoo!
Figurines - cats.
Video: how to make a cat - a fridge magnet?
Crafts from salt dough birds. Sculpt fish from salt dough
It is difficult to make birds and fish in testoplasty, but they do not turn out beautiful.
Such products are delicate work.
What crafts from salt dough to choose for a child of 5 years?
Forcing a five-year-old child to sculpt something that an adult wants is simply impossible. He needs to be interested. The kid should be offered several ideas, let him choose the one that he likes best.
Video: salt dough - recipe for crafts
A wonderful activity for a child is modeling from various materials. It perfectly develops the fine motor skills of the baby. However, there is a minus in this type of needlework - the child may accidentally eat the material. It follows that it is not recommended for kids to work with clay and plasticine, but salt dough is very suitable! It is easy to use and safe for kids.
The dough can be used to create any figures. Even one and a half year old babies, under the supervision of their parents, can create their first masterpieces from it, and for older children this activity can become a real hobby.
Try to show your imagination with your child and start making products of incredible beauty.
How to make salt dough
This material can afford to cook absolutely everything, because the ingredients for it are available in every kitchen.
For cooking salt dough you will need:
- 200g salt;
- 2 cups of flour;
- incomplete glass of water;
- 2 tablespoons of starch (if you are sculpting relief figures).
Mix salt with flour and, if necessary, with starch, add water, mix, add one tablespoon sunflower oil and start kneading. The dough should not crumble and stick to your hands - watch this, adjust the readiness of the dough with water and flour. Properly prepared dough should be well molded. Ready dough wrap in a plastic bag and refrigerate for a couple of hours. After that, you can start sculpting.
Drying salt dough
The crafts you made from the dough must be dried. This can be done in several ways.
You can just put the figurines in the room and leave for a while. However, it is best to bake crafts in the oven. It should be noted that modeling is necessary in the same place where the figure will dry. For this, it is ideal to use foil.
After finishing work on the craft, put it in a cold oven, set the temperature to fifty degrees to start to avoid cracks. After thirty minutes, add the temperature to one hundred degrees. Dry on average one to two hours.
After drying, sand the craft with sandpaper.
How to color salt dough crafts
For painting the figurines, take paints with an acrylic base - they are most suitable for this. Such paints dry instantly, have a rich color and do not smell at all. However, these paints are expensive. Therefore, you can use gouache or watercolor paints.
You can also color the dough while kneading by adding a few drops of food coloring or acrylic paint to it, but do it in moderation. Ordinary cocoa powder is also good for coloring the dough.
At the end of the work, the figure is varnished. To do this, take a glossy or matte varnish with a water base.
Sculpting from salt dough with children
Owl
Take a spoon and separate two parts of the dough with it. This will be the body and head of the owl. Make figures of the required shape from these pieces and fasten them. Separately, take a strip of dough and make small cuts on it - this will be the collar. Put it on the body and draw wings with a knife. Use the remaining small pieces of dough to make the eye and beak. Dry the finished figure and paint to your liking.
Cat
First, divide the dough into separate parts. To make the body, you will need the largest piece of dough to make the head - a little smaller, use the rest to make the tail, face, paws, eyes and ears.
Roll out the dough into two circles, flatten them on the cardboard. Get the base for the body and head of the cat. On a small circle we make a face from a separate piece of dough. We attach eyes, ears, tail, paws. Note that each detail should be three to five millimeters thick.
Dry the resulting cat in the oven. After that, we decorate it with black, and shade the tail, antennae and eyes with white, draw the mouth with red.
Caterpillar
Separate small pieces from the salt dough, make balls of various sizes out of them. The head is a larger ball, the body is a few small balls. The number of circles will determine the size of your caterpillar.
Fasten the received parts to each other. For better bonding, wet the contact points with water. You can either make a caterpillar face using modeling or draw. For mustaches, simple matches are suitable.
Dry the finished caterpillar in the oven and paint to taste.
Hedgehog
First of all, take some ball - this will be the basis for the torso. It can be made of plastic, wood or any other material. Wrap this ball with an even layer of dough so that there are no holes.
Make the eyes and nose of the hedgehog in the same way with the help of dough or use regular peppercorns.
Among lovers of needlework, salt dough has long been successfully used as a material for creating flat and three-dimensional sculptures. In general, modeling is traditionally loved, probably, by all children from a very young age, and many creatively oriented adults are not averse to working with plasticine. However, plasticine, for a number of reasons, is not always suitable for children, and for babies who can swallow it, it is generally undesirable, unless under the supervision of adults, which does not always work out. But salt dough is a wonderful, affordable and practically harmless material. In addition, it has a number of features, it is interesting to work with it, so modeling from salt dough occupies a separate place among popular hobbies.
Let's make salt dough
A tempting and indisputable advantage of this material is its availability: the dough is prepared independently, in the right amount, and all the few ingredients are available in almost any kitchen - in last resort, you can run to the nearest grocery store, while you don’t have to spend a lot of money.
Salt dough recipe for crafts
200 grams table salt mix with 2 glasses wheat flour and 2 tablespoons of starch, add about ¾ cup of water and a tablespoon of sunflower oil. Mix it all up well. The right dough for modeling it does not crumble and does not stick to hands, it takes and holds the shape given to it well. In the process of preparing the dough, its structure can be adjusted by adding (small portions) water or flour, depending on whether the dough is too thick or watery.
Starch, by the way, is not a mandatory component - it is more needed to create voluminous relief figures, although many people add it all the time, regardless of what they are going to sculpt.
After the dough is cooked and molded well, put it in a plastic bag and place it in the refrigerator for a couple of hours.
Drying of finished products
In order to securely fix the shape of the resulting salt dough crafts, it must be dried. After drying, your product, unlike plasticine, will look like new for many years. 
So how do you dry the craft? Yes, everything is very simple: you can leave it in the same place where it was sculpted and dry it for a while (no one will say how much - it all depends on such factors as the temperature and humidity of the air in the room, the humidity of the dough itself, etc.) in a natural environment. However, we recommend baking finished crafts in the oven - in this way, in some way, there is an analogue of firing clay products in an oven, however, under much more gentle conditions: place the craft in a cold oven and set the temperature to about 50 ° C, leave for half an hour, then increase the temperature up to 100 ° C and dry for another hour and a half. Such phasing is necessary so that the dough does not crack, but bakes gradually and reliably.
Finished product painting
The dried and cooled craft should sand with fine sandpaper, straightening the regular roughness, then color according to the creative plan. Acrylic paints (with an acrylic base) are best suited for their rich color, fast drying and other advantages. However, salt dough is good because ordinary inexpensive gouaches or watercolors will also do an excellent job - indeed, one of the most accessible types of creativity! 
Another interesting option- color the dough itself before sculpting, if in the process of kneading add a little food coloring to it (cocoa powder, by the way, also colors the dough beautifully) or acrylic paint: continue kneading, achieving uniform coloring of the entire mass. 
The last step in making the craft is to cover its already painted surface with a glossy or matte (at your discretion) water-based varnish. Now the figure created by your hands or the hands of your child can take its rightful place as an interior decoration, christmas decoration, toys, and also serve as a great gift. Success in creative work!
decorate the fashionable interiors of apartments and shops, handmade jewelry complements the collections of costumes of fashion designers, gifts, hand-made toys are very popular among adults and young people
I want to tell about
salt dough products
which today occupy their niche among handicrafts
Modeling from salt dough gives great freedom to imagination, and products from it, at times, amaze with their beauty and grace.
This type of creativity gives pleasure and joy, like any other.
Many people think: well, just think, some kind of salty dough - all these are crafts (implying the childishness of the product).
But, only those who do not know that think so
Since ancient times, people have sculpted from salt dough, not only in Russia, but in all European countries, it was customary to give wreaths, doll figures or other amulets from salt dough.
Why from the test?
It's very simple - salt dough is a surprisingly energetically capacious material.
Everyone who has ever sculpted figurines from salt dough or received them as a gift has felt this positive impact on themselves.
Salt dough, like clay, has amazing energy, but if clay draws out all the negativity, salt dough, on the contrary, gives positive energy - goodness and warmth with this material is very pleasant to work with.
If you liked the idea of interesting creativity that you can create with your child, then be sure to remember and try the following recipe in practice:
salt dough recipe
1 cup flour
1 glass of salt
1 tablespoon vegetable oil
1/2 cup water
The process of making salt dough is incredibly simple. Pour a glass of salt into a deep bowl (or any other convenient container) and pour half a glass of hot water.
Next, we stir the salt with water and add a glass of flour. Stir the salt dough until homogeneous mass. For convenience, you can use a mixer.
In the salty dough, you need to add one or two tablespoons of vegetable oil, dry wallpaper paste or a spoonful of hand cream.
Vigorously mix everything in the bowl with your hands, if the dough is too sticky to your hands, add a little flour mixed with salt.
Put the resulting mass of salt dough in a plastic bag and place in the refrigerator for 2-3 hours. After that, you can sculpt from salt dough. If after modeling you still have dough left, then store it in the refrigerator in plastic bag.
The dough is ready, now you can mold all kinds of figures from it. Put the finished crafts on a baking sheet and put in a cold oven, where we keep it on low heat (80%) for about an hour or a little more if the figures have not had time to completely harden. After drying, the figures can be painted and varnished.
Salt Dough Tips:
1. Keep the container with salt dough closed, because left open, in the air, salt dough dries very quickly.
2. To prevent the dough from sticking to your hands, you need to add a little flour to it.
3. To prevent the dough from crumbling, you need to pour a little water into it.
4. Unused dough should be stored in the refrigerator - there it will last one to two days.
5. To give the dough a pleasant smell and color, you can add spices to it, for example, cumin, pepper, curry, nutmeg, cinnamon, etc.
6. In order to check whether the figures have dried well, tap them with your finger. If the sound is sonorous, the dough has dried out, and if it is deaf, then it is not yet.
7. After the oven, the dough figures can be painted with gouache and then varnished.
8. If cracks appear on the figurine after drying, dilute a little PVA glue, mix well and apply this mass to the crack, rubbing it.
Salt Dough Coloring Methods
Salt dough can be tinted with food coloring, watercolor or gouache. You can also color while preparing the dough, introducing the dye during kneading, and already actually ready product- on the surface.
A great chocolate color obtained by adding cocoa. You can experiment with other natural dyes- soot, beet juice, carrots, ocher, etc. You can brown the salt dough product in the oven for a natural color.
When tinting, keep in mind that after drying, the color will become less saturated, but if you cover the craft with varnish, it will become brighter again. What varnish can be used? Acrylic and artistic is very good. It is also possible to use a conventional water-based construction material for breathable surfaces, i.e. for parquet or wood.
Features and methods of preparing salt dough:
There are a few things you can't do with salt dough. So, for example, you can’t add pancake flour (or flour with any other additives) to salted dough, since the figures will rise as they dry. good dough for pies and crack.
Also, you can not add iodized salt, large inclusions do not dissolve, subsequently the dough is not homogeneous - into a grain. Similarly, you cannot add rock salt without prior dissolution.
About water. So, in the test it is best to use very cold water; be sure to add in parts of 50 ml after each addition, knead (due to the fact that for different flour, may be needed different amount water).
Salt is first mixed with flour, and only then water is poured into the finished mass.
Salt dough is stored in a plastic bag or a tightly sealed container. It is better to take out salt dough from a plastic bag in small pieces, since lumps of dough quickly become covered with a crust and when rolled out or molded, these dry crusts spoil the look.
And one more thing, if the figures are thick (more than 7 mm), then after the first stage, you need to remove the excess dough from the back
The dough may be too soft. Then proceed as follows: mix a tablespoon of flour with a tablespoon of salt at the bottom of a bowl. Press the ball of dough into this mixture and then knead it. Do this until the dough becomes more dense.
You can sculpt or cut out figures immediately on a baking sheet. The baking sheet should first be moistened with water, in which case bubbles will not form between the product and the surface of the baking sheet, therefore, the surface of the product will be even and stable.
Everything that falls off is just wonderful and, most importantly, it is not noticeably glued with PVA glue.
Swelling or crackling of salt dough crafts occurs in three cases:
- If the flour is incorrectly selected. For greater strength, you can add to the dough rye flour(the color will be warmer and there should be no crackling) (for example, a glass of ordinary + a glass of rye, 1 to 1), 50 gr. starch - also give the dough elasticity and prevent cracking. You can also add PVA glue, since it also gives plasticity and prevents the dough from rising.
- If drying is not done correctly (see next section)
If crackling occurs after painting, this means that the product has not completely dried out (the product continues to dry and the air needs to go somewhere), so the surface of the paint or varnish is cracking. Do not rush to paint or varnish the product, so that later you do not regret and do not redo it.
Frequently asked question: how to dry salt dough?
Air dry best vivo, but this is a long time (complete drying can take a week or more - especially if the humidity during drying is high - as salt draws moisture), so you can dry it in the oven, following a few rules.
- The oven must be at the lowest temperature
- It’s good if drying goes with the oven lid ajar
- Items must not be placed in hot oven immediately, heating should occur gradually. As well as pulling the product out of the oven, it is better if it cools down gradually instead of with the oven
- It is ideal to dry in several stages: an hour dried on one side, turned the craft over, dries from the inside out. I still take breaks between drying, it dries in the oven for an hour - it dries itself for a day - then again for an hour and a half in the oven on the reverse side.
The drying time of a salt dough product depends on the thickness of the product itself. And also from the applied manufacturing recipe. So, dough containing butter, cream, etc. dries much longer than dough without oil-containing additives.
In order to avoid cracking of the product, it is possible to dry it in three to four stages, in the oven at the very minimum and always with the lid open for about an hour and a half, then a break for two or three hours, or all night, the craft dries itself, and then again turn on the oven to minimum with the lid open.
With natural and oven drying, the craft must be rotated at each stage of drying, i.e. hour dries with the front side, rests, turned over at the next stage and dries with the reverse side.
Thus, we have covered the basic recipes and methods for modeling salt dough.
Successful creativity!
