I have been scouring the internet these days looking for inspiration for crafts/decor for the upcoming holiday, Shavuot. On that search, I discovered salt dough! I have never used it before and WOW what a versatile material! I’m now convinced I could make anything from this stuff!
I’ve got four easy projects that I made all from one batch of the dough. If you think you’ll use a little less, it’s easy to half this recipe!
1 cup salt
1 cup water
4 cups flour
Let the salt dissolve a bit in the water and then knead in the flour (takes about 10 minutes!). I tried to do this in my stand mixer but it just got all clumpy so a good hand kneading is required.
Once the dough is ready and rolled and you’ve made your pieces, you’ll need to bake them. I baked mine at 350° for about 25 mins. You’ll need to adjust that according to your oven and your dough thickness.
Happy Shavuot Bunting Banner
This one was super simple to make! I just rolled out the dough to about 1/4” thickness and cut triangles. I made the bottom row a little taller than the top row. I used a drinking straw to punch holes in the dough for the string to run through. I baked the triangles and when cool, used a sharpie to draw the letters on-in the best Rae Dunn-esque font I could manage. I also made extras and wrote Sukkot on them so I could reuse the “Happy” and have a nice banner for my sukkah this fall!
I used a nice twine to hang this because the letters are in the heavy side and I wanted to make sure it would hold up.
Salt Dough Doves
To me, Shavuot symbolizes the giving of the spirit along with the giving of Torah. These doves are symbolic of the spirit.
I rolled out the dough and used a dove shaped cookie cutter to punch the shapes. Then I took rubber stamps and imprinted a pattern on them. I let my kids each choose a bird to decorate how they wanted. After stamping, we baked them and let them cool.
After cooling, we painted them with watercolor kids paint, the ones from the kid’s section at IKEA. Then we tied string and hung them in the archway between the kitchen and family room.
Shavuot Flower Decor
Since there are so many flowers this time of year, I love the idea of floral decor for Shavuot!
For this one, I rolled out the dough and used a rectangle cutter. At this point my dough batch was getting a bit dry so I suggest covering it in between projects to keep it from drying out.
I took paper clips and stuck them in lengthwise to become hangers. I used rubber stamps to stamp the flower design and them baked them in the oven.
Once cool, I had the kids help paint watercolor on them. Meanwhile, my husband made me a wooden board and put five hanging nails in it.
We hung this in our entranceway so our guests would see it as they come in!
Bonus Project: 10 Commandments
This one came as a last minute idea to use up the last of my dough. I had no special cookie cutter for this one, so I hand cut this one with a paring knife. After baking and cooling, I drew on the Hebrew letters with a sharpie. Makes a cute little knick knack for an extra tribute to the day!
That’s it! Hope that this gives you some ideas and would love to see what you guys come up with, or have made from this stuff in the past!
Chag Shavuot Sameach!