Crafts, Crafts and more "Craps"

My Sidekick (Brody) and I love, love, love doing "craps" together. This is the one time where we can make a mess and Momma (Me) doesn't short circuit. I know all kids need an artistic outlet and most are messy so I have to work on finding "OCD Friendly Craps" we can do :) I hate messes but my 2.5 year old thrives in them! So we compromise.....for now. Our favorite craft right now is painting figures made out of Baker's Clay. This is a bit time consuming but it's so much fun and you can use so many different types of Cookie Cutters to make interesting shapes for your little one to paint and decorate with paint pens, glitter, ribbon, sequins....whatever you want! Recipe is below (Thanks to "The Toddler's Busy Book by Trish Kuffner"):

BAKER'S CLAY RECIPE

4 cups of Flour

1 cup of Salt

1 teaspoon alum or cream of tartar

Food coloring (optional)

Large mixing bowl

Cookie Cutter (any shape or size)

Baking Sheet

Fine Sandpaper (optional)

Rolling Pin (optional)

Mix flour, salt, alum and water in bowl. If dough is too dry, knead in a tablespoon of water. Dough can be colored by dividing it into several parts and kneading a few drop of food coloring into each part. Once you get the color you desire roll the dough about 1/8 - 1/2 inch thick on a floured surface. Cut the dough with the cookie cutters dipped in flour. You will have enough dough to roll out and cut several times. If you are hanging the shapes make sure you make a hole before you bake. You can do this buy taking a straw and pressing into dough and removing the clay dot. Bake ornaments on an ungreased baking sheet for 30 minutes at 250 degrees. Turn and bake another 90 minutes until hard and dry. Remove from oven when cool. You can smooth the ornaments and sides with fine sandpaper if you wish but this is not necessary. Now you can decorate with Acrylic paint, glitter, markers, etc. I usually spray them afterwards with an Acrylic spray paint. 

Fresh out of the oven!

Try this kid friendly recipe because it's a lot of fun and it will make PLENTY of ornaments to stash away for a rainy day project. Let me know if you have any questions! You can use these as gift tags, necklaces, tokens, bookmarks, etc.....use your imagination! Let me know if you come up with a cute idea for these :) I believe I will be using little clay hearts for the Valentine's Day goody bags for B's preschool classmates!

Happy Crafting!

xoxo