Craft dough without wheat!!!

While enjoying the Christmas season we were looking for some fun ways to create ornaments for the tree. The "doughs" I have seen before are wheat-full and therefor not appropriate for my family. 

In my quest for Gluten Free home made dough, I discovered a blog post that really got me excited.

I was so inspired that I thought "Hey - we are going to try this over the weekend or you know... NOW!" We did the whole dough-thing a few times during the Christmas season. It was super fun and novel since we have avoided "dough" for so long.


Out to the grocer I went to fetch copious amounts of baking soda and corn starch! I discovered that this is a very very affordable craft project! (Hail store brand cheapness ♥!)  It does help if you already have cookie cutters - but they had them at the Dollartree store in bags



of 6 Christmas shapes so even that was quite cost effective.






Gather the following~

2 cups of baking soda
1 cup of cornstarch
1 cup of water

How to cook up some GF craft dough:

• Combine the baking soda, cornstarch and water in a medium pot and stir over medium heat until all ingredients are dissolved. It begins very thin. Patience and a lot of stirring are necessary. Continue to stir using medium-low heat. Be careful not to scald the mixture. 
• Remove the hot mixture from the stove and allow to cool. While covered with a wet cloth.
• When cool knead dough. If mixture seems dry add a little water at a time. Kneed mixture until its smooth and still moist.
• Roll out dough to 1/4" or thicker and cut into shapes as desired.
• Bake shapes on foil covered cookie sheet in the oven. 175 degrees F for one hour, flip then bake for another hour at the same temp. The items need to cool completely prior to decorating. I turn the oven off and leave them inside. 



It starts out thin - be patient
and keep stirring!

• Once completely cool and dry shapes can be decorated then sealed with Modgepodge.  

 


This is what we did once we had cooled dough:

• First we rolled out dough to 1/4"  - too much thicker and we found that it won't cook all the way, thinner and it breaks too easily.
• We used cookie cutters or a plastic knife to create shapes.
• We found that a plain straw is easily used to make a hole in each ornament for the ribbon - Pinch the straw as you remove it at a 45ish degree angle from the dough so the holes edges are smoother.
• We used rubber stamps (both inked and dry), textured items (like keychains, fancy paperclips, and charms) to texturize and make impressions upon the surface. We tried both gold and silver ink too.
• We baked the ornaments at 175 f. for one hour, then flipped  them over and again for another hour. Then we just turned it off and did some non related things. The next day We looked to further decorate and seal the items.
• After baking we tried a variety of decorating ideas. We used markers, watercolor paints, and finger paints. Please, note that when you use ink it changes color a bit as it is baked and then sealed.
• Before sealing (using Modgepodge) we used Sharpie markers to write on the rear of each ornament. 

Craft  Dough  Ornaments - my take:

• After baking, carefully (*!*) file around the edges with a nail file or emery board - The big chunky kind seems to be easiest. This is a very messy step so we did it over the sink when it was to cold to go outside. Also be careful because shapes break easily during this step.

• Keep a bowl of water near by because you do not want your project to become dry. They will crack during baking if not moist enough when forming. 

• Also, I used a lot of paper to line the table we were working on. However, I found it better to use foil on the baking pan because the paper became wrinkled in the oven effecting the surface of the cut-out shapes. 

• After the first batch we decided it was easier to cook the dough in the evening after the kiddies were sleeping and save the dough for the morning. It saved wonderfully each time. 

• Clean up is very easy as the whole thing is water soluble. I ran the cutters and pan through the dishwasher. Obviously the paper helped a lot because it kept the dough off the table cloth. However we did get it all over a couple of kitchen towels and they washed out easily in the washing machine. Inks etc may not be as easy and sometimes they bleed so be cautious of that. 

I am already plotting some craft dough easter cut outs! I am thinking eggs and bunies. Eggs will be so fun for the kids since they don,t color real chicken eggs due to allergies. But if they texturize and color these we can bring them back out yearly! oh the possibilities!

I hope that you enjoy this dough too. It really is great fun! Perhaps you'll like some hearts for Dwyndwyn and Valentines. 

Warm Wishes, 

-Mom