Easy to make pendants – use salt dough for amazing results.
DIY easy to make pendants are a crafters dream.
Easy to make and inexpensive is even better!
In my latest YouTube tutorial video, I demonstrate easy to make pendants that are very easy on your pocket too.
BUT – lots of things went wrong in this project. Why? Because I am a salt dough newbie!
These are easy to make, I just wasn’t happy with some of them because they were too thick and chunky.
I had wanted to make something that fitted with love hearts and Valentine’s Day.
So I was happy with the red and gold hearts but pretty much everything else I didn’t like too much!
So what went wrong with my easy to make pendants?
Well, for a start, I tried to bake the salt dough pendant bases in the microwave oven.
An old craft book I have recommended cooking the dough in 10 second bursts until done.
Uh Uh! No – of course I didn’t have the patience for that so I had them on too high for too long.
They puffed up like little clouds and went brittle, as you will see in the YouTube video.
So, back to the drawing board! Idid the next batch in the regular oven for almost three hours on 100 degrees centigrade.
That was much better! My pendants were MUCH better baked that way – it just took longer.
But that was fine, I went off and did other stuff while they were cooking happily in the oven.
So why wasn’t I happy with the results?
Well some of the pendant bases were way too chunky for my liking. Mainly the bigger, oval ones. They were just too clumsy looking for me.
I loved the red and gold hearts and some of the black and gold, but not the really thick ones.
But hey – that’s good news – right? We learn by our mistakes.
My biggest mistake was rolling the dough out to thick.
There was an easy solution for when I made my next batch (I have another video coming up soon about how I did this again – only better!),
I went a got myself a special little rolling pin that is normally used for rolling out cake icing.
The rolling pin you see above has a simple touch that is genius!
You see the purple rubber rings on the ends?
They keep the rolling pin at a certain height so your dough is rolled out to an even thickness.
There are two different heights – you just use which ever rings you need.
When I rolled out my dough for the second YouTube tutorial about salt dough pendants, it was much thinner.
So the resulting pendant bases are much more dainty.
I can’t wait to decorate them and show you the results.
Now what about that salt dough?
Well this is why these are easy to make pendants! And better still, inexpensive to make.
All you need is a bag of plain white flour, a tub of ordinary table salt and some warm water.
Use the ingredients in equal measure – one cup of flour, one cup of salt and one cup of warm water.
Add the water a bit at a time in case you don’t need quite all of it.
And don’t knead it too much – just enough to get smooth.
I kneaded my first batch a lot – as if I was making bread!
That’s why my pendant bases rose and went puffy – I got too much air in there during the kneading process.
I also put mine in the fridge overnight so it was easier to cut.
Coming up next time – more, easy to make pendants, but with lessons learned from this project!
I’m partway through filming me making a much better set of salt dough pendants. There is no such thing as a craft project that is a failure!
I thought I would give you a glimpse of one that bombed – there is no shame in getting it wrong!
We learn from mistakes – so watch out for my next YouTube project to see if I improve on these pendants.
There are many accomplished salt dough crafters out there making some amazing things.
If I keep trying, maybe one day…😍
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I hope you try out my idea for easy to make pendants – thank you for stopping by!