Salt dough ideas for the garden – make garden decorations & useful tools

Salt dough is one of the most popular handicraft materials for children and adults. It has the practical advantage over craft clay that you don’t have to buy it first. You can make salt dough spontaneously from simple ingredients that you already have at home. So if the bad weather caught you unprepared and you want to pass the time in your own four walls, you are making the right choice with DIY ideas for salt dough. But of course you can’t just get creative with it in rainy weather. The good weather season has started and for this reason we are showing you some great handicrafts made from the simple material especially for the outdoor area. These salt dough ideas for the garden are not only pretty to look at, but sometimes even really practical and a wonderful gift idea.

In the three links below, you will not only find suggestions for specific occasions such as Easter and Christmas, but also a selection of recipes that you can also use for today’s salt dough ideas for the garden. With some recipes you have to bake the dough, with still others you get salt dough without baking.

Salt dough ideas for the garden – signs for flower pots and beds

If you have planted a lot of spices, it would of course be useful to label them so that you also know where what is. Newcomers in particular cannot yet easily distinguish the plants optically and receive weatherproof information with such labels. But even professionals could forget which plants are in which pot or where in the bed immediately after sowing and as long as the plants are not yet visible. Either way, these salt dough ideas for the garden prove to be really practical. Or how about you put together a set as a gift? A flower pot, seeds, potting soil and of course the matching label and you will receive great salt dough gifts with which you can make someone happy.

• salt dough
• small stamps with letters (or alternatively marker pen to write on)
• Knives, cookie cutters or other tools for cutting out
• optional transparent varnish

Use any salt dough recipe to prepare the dough, roll it out thinly, and then cut any shapes for the labels. As in the example, they can be long, narrow shapes with a tapering side, but also circles to which you add a point, triangles and other interesting shapes are ideal. Just experiment! If you use stamps, do so before baking the dough. Just press the letters into the soft batter. If you use a marker pen or other colors to write on, you can do this after baking and cooling. Finally, you can give the finished labels a shine by painting the salt dough. However, this is optional (keep in mind that varnish can dissolve the edding, depending on what kind of varnish you are using).

Fairy garden as a salt dough decoration

You have surely seen these mini gardens in a pot or in a bowl. The so-called fairy gardens are very trendy and are decorating more and more outdoor areas – be it on the terrace, on the balcony, the veranda and the entrance area or a seating area in the garden. But it is not always easy to find exactly the elements you want to decorate with. So just do it yourself! The following salt dough ideas for the garden are specially designed for a mini garden in a bowl – by the way, also a great idea if you want to make gifts out of salt dough!

In principle, you can make any figure you want out of the salt dough yourself.

• For stepping stones For example, you can form small balls out of the dough and then press them flat. You can then use a pointed object (e.g. toothpick) to scratch in patterns.
• mushrooms consist of two elements. Make the stem first. To do this, you first form a ball and then a cylinder shape. It doesn’t have to be perfectly shaped. Press the ends flat on a flat surface. First make a ball for the umbrella and press it flat. Then press in the middle to get the typical umbrella shape. Once the items are baked and tough, you can glue them together and make the mushroom that way.
• That Bird bath In principle, make the same as the mushroom, except that you place the shield element upside down on the cylinder. To do this, you need to make sure that the pointed side of the screen goes flat this time. Place the elements on top of one another and smooth the edges to create a smooth transition without a joint.
• How about one Fountain? Starting again with a ball, press your thumb in the center to make a hollow, then use your fingers to sculpt the walls. You will end up with a hollow cylinder. You can provide this with a stone or brick pattern. Use a toothpick for this, for example.

Tinker fairy door yourself for a tree

With a little skill you can also make such playful doors as salt dough ideas for the garden. They usually decorate a tree in the garden so that it appears as if a fairy or gnome is living in the tree. You could therefore make a few windows to match the door and attach them to the tree as well. Roll out the dough a little thicker and then cut out the door shape you want. It can be classically rectangular or oval, but it can also be made round or in an irregular or heart shape.

Next, you’ll use a toothpick to design the boards and wood grain, as well as other elements for the door (such as an edge made of stones). Any other decorations can then be added. For example, make small door hinges, a blade, leaves, flowers, a door wreath or whatever else you can think of out of the dough and simply attach them to the desired places. As soon as the dough has dried or has been baked and cooled, you can paint the door as you like. Use paints that are suitable for outdoor use and seal them with a layer of varnish. In addition to the dough, you can use other elements to decorate the door: beads, stickers, stones, etc..

Handicrafts with salt dough for Easter – conjure up creative Easter decorations with children

Making decorations with salt dough in autumn – creative instructions for children & adult

The Best Salt Dough Ideas For Christmas To Try This Year

How to paint salt dough?

Finally, you can paint on all the ready-baked or dried elements made of salt dough. Felt-tip pens are just as suitable for this as acrylic paints, finger paints (if, for example, you are tinkering the ideas with salt dough with children), window paints, touch-up pens and even wax crayons and watercolors. Or how about using colored glitter by first applying glue and then sprinkling glitter over it? Keep in mind that not all of the colors mentioned are weatherproof and therefore not necessarily suitable for salt dough ideas for the garden. Some then belong more in covered outdoor areas, where you will not get rain and direct sunlight.

Making figures out of salt dough with children – snakes

Working with salt dough is just as much fun for the children as it is with modeling clay – the big difference here is that the self-made works are retained and can be set up later. How about a few snakes as salt dough ideas for the garden? After all, it is not uncommon for them to inhabit our gardens. They are really easy to do, so the craft project is great even for smaller children. What you need:

• salt dough
• Acrylic paint
• Clear varnish for sealing
• paint brush

And that’s how easy it is to make the cute salt dough ideas for the garden: the children can shape rolls of any length from the salt dough. You can then shape these in any way you want – into a wave shape typical of snakes, rolled up in a spiral or irregularly wavy. The imagination knows no limits! Then bake the snakes or let them air dry for several days (since they are thick figures, baking would probably be the more advantageous option). As soon as the dough has cooled, the children can paint the snakes as they wish. For this purpose, you can also choose pictures of real snakes and use them as templates for colors and patterns. Seal the colors with a layer of clear lacquer and distribute the snakes in the garden.

Salt dough ideas for spring and summer – snails

Snails are also part of the garden at home and these cute figures as salt dough ideas for the garden are not only super likeable, they are even made easier than snakes. Make rolls again, but shorter this time. You then put an empty snail shell on these rolls. You can use pearls for the eyes.

tip: Would you like colorful snails? Then you can color the dough as you like in advance. You can color salt dough, for example, with food coloring. These are also harmless to children.

Salt dough ideas for the garden – flower pots as a gift idea

A great project for both children and adults is such a flower pot or planter. This can not only decorate your own garden, but also serve as a wonderful gift. For example, are you looking for some salt dough ideas for Mother’s Day? Then you have one right here! And best of all, you don’t have to try to conjure up a regular and perfect container, which is why it’s so good for kids too. The more irregular the better!

You can either shape your dough into a large ball, then press in the middle with your fist and then shape the walls of the pot with your hands, or you can roll out the dough, place a bowl upside down in front of you, cut the desired piece and place it over the bowl to keep its shape. So then let the dough dry. If it is not going to be a cachepot but a flowerpot to plant on, you should add a few draining holes before it dries.

How about using the finished pot for the gift idea mentioned above? Add seeds and potting compost and make a few more sticks out of salt dough that you label. By the way, you can also use this idea to Salt dough tealight holder to manufacture. To do this, simply make the same container in a much smaller size for a tea light or slightly larger for a pillar candle.

Salt dough ideas for the garden – salt dough tags

Pendants made from this handicraft material are the classic par excellence and they can of course also be used as decoration in the garden. With imprints, brightly painted or as a suncatcher with transparent pearls – the variants are really numerous. Especially for children, trailers are quick and easy salt dough craft ideas that can fill an afternoon. And the salt dough ideas for the garden can then decorate trees, bushes, railings and the terrace.

The best thing is that salt dough is quite weatherproof, so such pendants can decorate the garden at any time of the year. To get the right shapes, you can use regular cookie cutters and work with them as you would with regular cookie dough. For example, snowflakes are great salt dough ideas for Christmas, in autumn you can use typical autumn colors and motifs, while in spring Easter motifs or simple flower patterns are suitable. For example, press leaves or flowers into the still soft dough to get a nice impression. This can then also be designed with additional colors.

Decorate a large plate with stones to lean against