Salt Dough Ornaments

4.63 from 53 votes

Learn how to make salt dough Christmas ornaments using this how-to! This salt dough recipe can be used for many other kids' crafts.

Prep Time10

Active Time30

Bake Time2

Total Time2 40

Yield: ornaments

Cost: $1

Make the dough by mixing the flour, salt, and water in a bowl. Knead the dough to combine. If your dough is too dry, add a bit more water, if it's too wet, just add more flour. Salt dough is very forgiving; it's hard to mess it up!
Roll out the dough on a flour and cornstarch dusted surface, around 1/4 inch thick. Use a gingerbread man-shaped cookie cutter to cut your shapes. For any remaining dough, gather it up and form it into another ball to roll out and cut. Repeat until there is little to no dough left.
Use the end of a drinking straw or skewer to poke a hole at the top of each ornament for hanging.
Place on a baking sheet and bake at 250F degrees (121 C) for 2-3 hours. Let cool. Flip the gingerbread men a few times so they bake evenly and do not curl up. Allow them to cool completely. If desired, sand off sharp edges.
Mod Podge the top, sides and bottom of your gingerbread ornaments once baked and dry to seal and so you have a nice, even surface for painting. Let dry.
Paint and decorate your ornament - to give it a gingerbread color, I used a mixture of tan and brown acrylic paints. Let dry completely. Add embellishments with acrylic paint markers for the ‘icing’, or even using puffy paint, ribbons, trim and other craft items.
Once everything is dry, seal with another coat (or two) of matte Mod Podge, and then add your ribbon or twine to hang.

Bake ornaments until hard and dry - mine took about 2 hours.