How to Make Salt Dough Memory Stones DIY: Easy Crafts for Kids

Salt Dough Memory Stones are easy to create and make great gifts for teachers, friends, and loved ones. My mom, The Jersey Grammy, has a birthday coming up, and we wanted to make her a beautiful personalized stepping stone for her garden. But Michael's did not have the kit I wanted, so I wound up buying the cheaper version, which was all they had. That resulted in, not one, but two failed garden stones. What a waste of time and money! After that fiasco, I thought, let's try to make our own memory stones. Obviously, these can't go outside in the garden, but here's what we came up with...

This is one of the easiest crafts I know, and I love that your house smells like pizza when you bake it.

You Will Need:

- 3 cups flour
-1 cup salt
-1 1/4 cup water
-glass mosaic pieces, seashells, etc. for decorating
-parchment paper

Step 1.  There aren't too many steps to this so I will just lump it all together for you. Stir all ingredients and then knead with hands after a soft dough forms (as I mixed it I thought, 'this isn't going to work!' but the dough stiffened up, so I was wrong about that).

Form your dough into two small balls, and then flatten into two 6" circles on parchment paper. My one big mistake was putting it on foil.  Do NOT put it on foil for baking. Mine stuck to the foil!  Ack!

Be sure to roll your circle on parchment paper.  Do not bake it on foil (like I did) as it can stick to the foil after baking.  Not cool!

Step 2.  Decorate your memory stone with glass mosaic pieces or oven safe items.  We also added a hand print to one of our stones.

The dough does not harden quickly so you don't have to rush!

Remember not to use foil like we did.  Be sure to do your decorating on parchment paper or even right on the cookie sheet.  Foil will result in sticking.  Learned that the hard way!!!

Step 3.  When your designs are complete, place them in the oven for 2 hours at 275 degrees.  I recommend flipping them over at some point so you can be sure they bake on both sides.  Ours baked beautifully on top but wound up sticking on the bottom (to the foil).  If you're baking on parchment paper or a cookie sheet, this probably won't happen to you.  Flipping the stones over at some point may help, or baking them directly on the oven rack.  I also heard you can spray the cookie sheet, but I fear that might make the dough greasy on the bottom.

When you're ready for baking, do not bake on foil.

They smell delicious when baking, almost like pizza! They also shouldn't spread or change too much when baking. They pretty much come out looking the same way as they went in, maybe a tad bit puffier.

Step 4.  Remove from oven and let cool. Hopefully, you'll have a beautiful finished product! I don't recommend putting them outside. They are really meant to be display pieces. We put ours on little plate stands and gave them to Grammy as gifts. She loved them! And many thanks to my friend Lynn S, who helped point us in the right direction with this project.

Jersey Momma Tips:

If your stones stick or don't cook evenly on the bottoms, don't fret. We put ours back in the oven to firm them up a bit more. Since they were not very pretty on the bottom (they looked kind of like the crunched up back of a cookie), we decided to hot glue gun a cardboard backing on it. Not very classy, but it kept the stone from crumbling!

We sealed the back of this stone with a hot glue gun and cardboard.  Classy, eh?

Salt dough creations make great gifts.  You can make them all different sizes or even make them into ornaments (put a hole in them before baking).  If you add a touch of food coloring to them, you can change the color of the dough.  The possibilities are endless!

***NOTE:  Several months after making these, I noticed them on display at The Jersey Grammy's house. They were on little stand-up easels in her living room, but both had developed cracks down the middle. My sister, who is an artist/art teacher said,"Oh yeah, salt dough cracks, that's just what it does."  I don't know if there's a way to stop the cracking or if it just happens over time, but just be aware that you might see cracks form in it over time. It didn't split apart or anything, but it's surely noticeable.  Although, The Jersey Grammy didn't notice it at all... 

And here are some of my Amazon Affiliate picks for Salt Dough Memory Stone decorations!