DIY ornaments | Popcorn & Chocolate

Marble Salt Dough Ornaments

Marble salt dough ornaments | Popcorn and ChocolateLearn how to make these marble salt dough ornaments to decorate your tree this year!

Marble salt dough ornaments | Popcorn and Chocolate

DIY Christmas Ornaments | Popcorn and ChocolateOne of my absolute favorite things to do during the holidays is to decorate the Christmas tree. I love pulling out each of our carefully wrapped ornaments and remembering different stories about them. Sometimes the story is as simple as I remember picking that up at Target with my friend (Target has the best ornaments, fyi). Sometimes you pull out an ornament and laugh and remember the time when your dog stole it off the tree and ate half of its leg or ear (this is a lot of our ornaments).

DIY salt dough ornaments | Popcorn and Chocolate

Letter ornaments | Popcorn and Chocolate

But the best stories are when you stumble across an ornament that you made yourself. Most of mine are from when I was 5 years old and it is just a giant piece of cardboard with my hand print painted on it. Talented as I was back then I think my ornament DIY game has stepped up a bit.

DIY marble salt dough ornaments | Popcorn & Chocolate

Today we are sharing marble salt dough ornaments to create fun holiday memories for years to come as you pull them out next year or the year after to decorate your Christmas tree. Maybe one will have a missing limb from a large dog that eats everything (several of mine already do). Maybe one will be the one your little sibling made and they will be able to remember it when they are older.

Marble salt dough ornaments | Popcorn & Chocolate

Either way, these marble salt dough ornaments are simple to make and involve ingredients you should already have at home. If you enjoy marbling with nail polish you should definitely give this craft a go. We’ve been known to marble a few things before so we thought it might be fun for Christmas to take simple salt dough ornaments to the next level.

DIY marble salt dough ornaments | Popcorn and Chocolate

Materials:

  • 1  cup flour
  • 1/2 cup salt
  • 1/2 cup water
  • Rolling pin
  • Cookie cutters
  • Baking sheet
  • Oven
  • Straw
  • Nail polish in various colors
  • A bin or container you can ruin
  • Towel/rag
  • Ribbon

Making the salt dough ornaments:

  1. Start by making the salt dough. For this you will mix together the flour, salt and water until it forms a dough.  Note: we halved the recipe here as it seemed to make a lot a lot of ornaments with a full cup of flour but if you have a big party I would recommend to double our recipe.
  2. Once the salt dough is ready sprinkle some flour on a work surface and some on your rolling pin and roll out your dough. We rolled ours to about 1/4 inch thickness but you can keep yours as thick or as thin as you like. It is definitely easier to cut out the shapes with a slightly thicker dough, though.
  3. Start cutting out your shapes with cookie cutters or drawing your own using a knife. We made some letter ornaments by just gently cutting into the dough with a knife – this was a bit difficult on curvier letters so I would recommend getting a stencil if you want them to look nice.
  4. Place your ornament on a baking sheet and using the tip of a straw, poke a hole into where you want it to hang.
  5. Once all your ornaments are cut out pop them into the oven at 200°F for 2-3 hours. Note: you are basically drying out the dough so this takes a while. I think mine were in the oven for about 2.5 hours. Alternatively you could leave them out to air dry but this would take a really long time.

Marbling the salt dough ornaments:

  1. I highly suggest doing this outside. Get a bin or container you can ruin and fill it with room temperature water.
  2. Have your nail polish open and ready as well as your ornaments easily reachable because once you pour the nail polish you will have to work quickly.
  3. Lay out a towel/rag for the ornaments to dry on after you dip them in the nail polish.DIY salt dough ornaments | Popcorn & Chocolate
  4. Gently pour the color or colors of nail polish you want to use into your bin. If you want a thick marble effect use more nail polish but if you want it thinner then only pour a small amount of nail polish.DIY salt dough ornaments | Popcorn & Chocolate
  5. Quickly take your ornament and dip it into the water face down and pull it out. If you are unhappy with how the marble came out you can always dip it in the water again.
  6. Let dry on your towel/rag.
  7. If you still have a good amount of nail polish in your water quickly dip another ornament in, otherwise pour more nail polish and repeat the process.
  8. Since you basically had to dry out the salt dough and now got it wet again you will have to let it sit out in a dry environment for about 24 hours.
  9. Take a ribbon and loop it through the hole to hang up your ornament.

Now you have plenty of marble salt dough ornaments that you can pull out next year and remember when you made them. These salt dough ornaments would also make wonderful gifts to give to your friends and family.

DIY ornaments | Popcorn & Chocolate

Let us know in the comments below if you have any favorite ornaments or holiday traditions!

DIY marble salt dough ornaments | Popcorn & Chocolate

Now I just have to keep Olive from eating them all…

Marble Salt Dough Ornaments | Popcorn and Chocolate

DIY Valentine's Day Marbled Hearts | Popcorn & Chocolate

DIY Valentine’s Day Marbled Hearts

DIY Valentine's Day Marbled Hearts | Popcorn & ChocolateValentine’s day is in 4 days.. do you have do you have your gifts ready? If you are like us and do everything last minute, we have the perfect quick and easy DIY for you, and likely you already have all the supplies at home.DIY Valentine's Day Marbled Hearts | Popcorn & ChocolateDIY Valentine's Day Marbled Hearts | Popcorn & ChocolateTo make these Valentine’s day marbled hearts, you will need some nail polish, paper, and a container that you don’t mind getting covered in nail polish (we used an empty yogurt container).DIY Valentine's Day Marbled Hearts | Popcorn & ChocolateFirst cut out heart shapes on your paper. We recommend using card stock because it is sturdy and thick. You can either use a stencil to trace hearts or free-hand cut them out like we did. We also used the grade school heart making trick by folding the paper in half and cutting the heart along the fold so you have symmetrical sides.DIY Valentine's Day Marbled Hearts | Popcorn & ChocolateNext, fill up your container with lukewarm water and probably you should grab some paper towels at this point too because things will get a bit messy from here on out. Drizzle a couple of drops of nail polish into the container and repeat with however many colors you want to use. Finally, dip the paper heart into the container with the nail polish and pull out as straight as you can. Set on a paper towel to dry.DIY Valentine's Day Marbled Hearts | Popcorn & ChocolateDIY Valentine's Day Marbled Hearts | Popcorn & ChocolateThis project, although easy and uses minimal supplies, does take a little practice to get that pretty swirled marble look. We recommend working quickly once you have dropped the nail polish into the container as it tends to dry and get clumpy fast. We also recommend to have a toothpick or two handy between applications to clear out any residual nail polish. Just swirl the toothpick around the surface of the water and that’ll do the trick. Lastly, we definitely recommend wearing gloves and not making the mistake of dying your hands 4 different shades of pink like we did ;)DIY Valentine's Day Marbled Hearts | Popcorn & ChocolateThere you have it – a super simple last minute Valentine’s Day idea. You could hand these out as Valentine’s Day cards or just have fun making them for a little Galentine’s get-together.

Tell us: Do you leave everything to the last minute or do you plan far in advance? What are your Valentine’s Day plans?

DIY Valentine's Day Marbled Hearts | Popcorn & Chocolate