Make My Day Camp: SM: Air-Dry Clay Ornaments

Thursday, March 30, 2023

SM: Air-Dry Clay Ornaments

Today's starch madness is a craft instead of a recipe (finally!) using cornstarch. The site where I found it gave these directions, I took lots of pictures and notes of things I learned during the process. Oh, and I realize my coloring looks really messy - I just wanted to show what each coloring medium looked like (crayon, colored pencils, markers, craft paint), I wasn't trying very hard to make them cute LOL.

Mix together 1 part white glue (like Elmer's) and 2 parts cornstarch (for instance 1 cup glue and 2 cups cornstarch) until a moldable dough forms. Roll out the dough and cut shapes using a cookie-cutter. Poke a hole in the shape with a skewer or pencil if you want to hang it. Use a dry paintbrush to brush away any crumbs on the dough. Set the cutout shapes on a flat baking sheet lined with parchment paper, leave them overnight to dry out. Once dried out, the hardened shape is ready to be decorated - try coloring them with colored pencils, wax crayons, or acrylic paints. Add string or a ribbon to hang.

Sounds easy enough, right? I only wanted to make a couple ornaments so mixed together 1/3 cup glue and 2/3 cup cornstarch. I'm not sure what 'moldable dough' feels like but after I mixed the 2 together it was a ball so I turned it out onto some parchment paper to roll it out. Well it was so-so sticky that I couldn't get it off my hands to even attempt to roll it, and I worried about rolling glue with my wood rolling pin so I just tried to pat it into a flat shape best I could. Then I cut out dog shapes but when I tried to transfer them to a baking sheet they wouldn't come off the paper. Hmmm...

I tried lifting them with a thin spatula which sort of worked but the shapes were all wacky. Hmmm...

Walked away and cleaned my hands and some of the area on the counter - after a few minutes I went back to the dough that was leftover, sprinkled more cornstarch on top and rolled it back into a ball. Now that the glue had a little time to dry out, and with the extra cornstarch, I had a much less sticky ball that was firmer. And didn't stick to my hands - so I used more cornstarch like I would have used flour if I was rolling cookies and brushed it over the rolling pin and on a clean piece of parchment paper, then rolled the dough out. So much better! I could lift the shapes with no problem and they are much much better looking.

Bottom line - these were fun to make once I learned what 'moldable dough' is like and treated it like rolling out cookies. If you make the dough and it's really sticky just add more cornstarch until you can knead it and roll it out easily. I was also able to re-roll the scraps after cutting out the shapes so I could get more out of the dough. Clean up was easy enough with soap and water, but I think I'd do this on newspaper or a drop cloth next time - I did get glue stuck to the counter, it came off but clean-up could have been easier if done on a protected surface.

you can see how shiny the dough is in the above picture,
this was the first attempt without enough cornstarch

add more cornstarch and now it's not shiny
and feels more like clay

4 on the left are after adding more cornstarch,
the 2 sad ones on the right are just that - sad.

once dried the edges curled up - maybe I rolled the dough too thin?

yeah, don't try to press the edges back down!

don't judge the coloring, I wasn't going for best results - this is just to show you what each medium looks like. From left to right - crayon, colored pencil, marker, craft paint