kids activities, art and craft, play dough recipes and more

  • About
  • Activities
    • Active Games
    • Animals
    • Autumn
    • Baby Activities
    • Bedtime
    • Blocks
    • Colours
    • Construction
    • Days Of The Week
    • Dens
    • Faces Theme
    • Farms
    • Fast Fun Play
    • Fine Motor Skills
    • Gardening
    • Geography
    • Getting Lost
    • Gross Motor Skills
    • Guest Posts
    • Hand-Eye Co-Ordination
    • Homeschool
    • I Am Super Capes
    • Loose Parts
    • Mealtimes
    • Memory
    • Messy
    • Misc
    • Music And Rhymes
    • Nature
    • Out And About
    • Outdoor
    • Parenting
    • Playful Preschool
    • Poems
    • Rainbow Theme
    • Rainy Days
    • Recipes
    • Role Play
    • Sand
    • School Gardening Club
    • School Holidays
    • Science
    • Scissor Skills
    • Screen Free Week
    • Seaside
    • Simple Play :: Complex Learning
    • Small world play
    • Songs
    • Space Theme
    • Sponsors
    • Spring
    • Starting School
    • Summer
    • Time
    • Transport theme
    • Water Play
    • Winter
    • Winter Play Planner
    • Zero To Two: The Book Of Play
  • Art and Craft
    • All Art
    • All Crafts
    • Animals
    • Cardboard Box
    • Chalk
    • Clay
    • Collage
    • Handprint Crafts
    • Junk Models
    • Kids Art Explorers
    • Model Making
    • Painting
    • Paper Plate Crafts
    • Printing
    • Puppets
    • Sculpture
    • Sewing
    • Shapes
    • Toilet Roll Crafts
    • Watercolours
    • Weaving
  • By Age
    • 3 – 5 years
    • 5 and older
    • 8 and older
    • Baby
    • Toddlers
  • Festivals
    • All Souls’ Day
    • Birthdays
    • Bonfire Night
    • Chinese New Year
    • Christmas
    • Divali
    • Earth Day
    • Easter
    • Fathers Day
    • Halloween
    • Harvest
    • Homemade presents
    • Leap Year
    • Mothers’ Day
    • New Year
    • Pancake Day
    • Pi Day
    • Ramadan
    • Remembrance Day
    • Solstice
    • St. Swithin’s Day
    • St. David’s Day
    • St. George’s Day
    • St. Patrick’s Day
    • Thanksgiving
    • Valentine’s Day
    • Winter Solstice
    • World Book Day
  • Language
    • All Language
    • Alphabet
    • Books
    • Listening
    • Poetry
    • Reading
    • Sight words
    • Spellings
    • Stories
    • Storybook Springboard
    • Writing
  • Math
    • Adding and Subtraction
    • Counting
    • Fractions
    • Graphs
    • Matching
    • Pi
    • Repeating patterns
    • Shapes
    • Size and volume
    • Symmetry
    • Time
    • Times tables
    • Weight
  • Sensory
    • Clay
    • Cloud Dough
    • Discovery
    • Fizz
    • Ice
    • Paint
    • Play Dough
    • Recipes For Play
    • Sand
    • Sensory Tubs
    • Shaving Foam
    • Smell
    • Water
  • The Garden Classroom
  • NurtureStore Supporters

Christmas play dough recipe

07/12/2017 by Cathy James 15 Comments

This Christmas play dough recipe is inspired by the Christmas-flavoured sugar I make each year to go on our Christmas-movie-popcorn.

The sugar smells exactly like Christmas, with a blend of herbs and spices that fills the house with a festive feeling and, as I often have play dough on my brain, I thought why not try it for a Christmas play dough recipe?

Super Christmas play dough recipe - smells like Christmas spices. Great for sensory play and fine motor skills activities

Christmas Day play dough recipe

  The Amazing Play Dough Printables Pack  

Play dough is just fantastic – a super sensory play material that feels good, smells good, doesn’t make too much mess and my kids love it.

It’s great as a calm-down activity for giddy, festive kids, and put together with some Christmas cookie cutters it makes a lovely Christmas gift .

Here’s the recipe with the special blend of herbs and spices that smells exactly like Christmas.

 

Christmas play dough recipe

 

Start by filling your salt with all the Christmas flavour. Take one cup of salt and add:

1. the zest of an orange or two clementines

2. some vanilla pod

3. a good grating of nutmeg

4. three cloves

5. some ground cinnamon

6. a bay leaf

 

Christmas play dough recipe

 

Blitz this with a blender until everything is chopped, mixed and smelling wonderful.

 

Christmas play dough recipe

 

Add two cups of plain (all purpose) flour…

 

Christmas play dough recipe

 

two tablespoons of vegetable oil and two tablespoons of cream of tartar.

 

Christmas play dough recipe

 

Pour in one and a half cups of boiling water…

 

Christmas play dough recipe

 

and some food colouring. Red? Gold? Green? Then mix it and form it into a dough.

 

Christmas play dough recipe

 

Add some extra shine to the play dough recipe by pouring in a little glycerine.

 

Christmas play dough recipe

 

Add a good dash of glitter for some festive sparkle. Knead the dough for a few minutes and then you’re done.

Wrap the play dough in a plastic bag and it will last into the new year.

   

Filed Under: Christmas, Fine motor skills, Messy, Play Dough, Sensory, Winter Tagged: Christmas, kids activities, Messy, play doh, play dough, play dough recipe, playdough, sensory play

Previous article: Swoosh! Candy cane puffy paint recipe
Next article: Candy cane sensory tub

Comments

  1. The Monko says

    06/12/2012 at 8:54 pm

    awesome, I love this – especially the idea of it smelling of christmas

    Reply
  2. Jill@MomsGoneGlobal says

    06/12/2012 at 9:50 pm

    This seasonal play dough recipe is such a lovely idea! The holiday scents always bring back wonderful memories for me. This is a great way to create special new memories for kids! Thanks for sharing!

    Reply
  3. crystal @ Growing A Jeweled Rose says

    09/12/2012 at 10:20 pm

    Oh, I love this play dough recipe Cathy! LOVE! I bet it smells amazing!

    Reply
    • Cathy James says

      09/12/2012 at 10:28 pm

      It does, it does Crystal. You should give it a try. 🙂

      Reply
  4. Paula says

    10/12/2012 at 4:20 pm

    Hi, I was doing this receipe in a rush this morning and added all the spices but managed somehow to forget the salt. I now have a very sloppy dough. I don’t want to throw it away but Ive added lots more flour and after a short while of playing it’s back to putty? Do u know of anything I can do at this stage I rectify it? It does smell lovely though. Thank you.

    Reply
    • Cathy James says

      10/12/2012 at 5:07 pm

      Oh no Paula! The only thing I can think of is to make another batch (so you have the boiling water agent going in), add in your sloppy dough and add in the salt you missed out first time. I don’t think you’re going to get your current dough to work without the salt, and adding it in at this stage won’t work as there’s no water to dissolve it.

      Reply
  5. Lauren says

    12/12/2012 at 10:23 pm

    I love this!! I’m planning on making this to put in the goody bags for my son’s Christmas party. Will this recipe be enough for 19 kids or should I double it? I’ll obviously be giving small portions. Thanks!

    Reply
    • Cathy James says

      13/12/2012 at 1:04 pm

      Hi Lauren. I think I would certainly double and maybe even triple it for 19 kids, depending on how generous the portions will be. Hope all the kids like it!

      Reply
  6. Lorraine says

    15/11/2013 at 4:37 pm

    Does the red food coloring bleed when mixing/playing with the dough?
    I would hate to have kids running around with stained hands.

    Reply
    • Cathy James says

      18/11/2013 at 10:22 am

      Hi Lorraine. No, ours never does. I think it’s important to mix the colour in with all the other ingredients in the bowl, so the colour binds with the dough and then doesn’t bleed. It’s when you leave the colour out and only add it in to the finished dough at the end that I think you might find it gets on hands.

      Reply
  7. Sherrie Crandal says

    10/12/2013 at 12:36 am

    Oh my this sounds too good. Do the kids eat it? I love the natural sound of it. Thanks for sharing.

    Reply
  8. Sam says

    25/11/2014 at 9:43 pm

    I really cannot wait to make this for my class! I have 24 little ones and I know they will not be able to contain themselves over this! I know that I will have to triple the batch amount, however, how much salt should I start with initially? Thanks!!! Sam

    Reply
  9. Carly says

    18/12/2014 at 9:44 pm

    Where do I get the glycerine can’t find it

    Reply
    • Cathy James says

      19/12/2014 at 5:54 pm

      We get ours from the baking section of the supermarket Carly – but if you can’t find it, you can just leave it out and the dough will still be lovely, just not quite as shiny. Cathy

      Reply
    • Jessica Wilson says

      12/12/2017 at 6:42 pm

      Pharmacy’s sell it, that’s where I got mine last year when I wanted to make snow globes. Ask at the counter they will be able to help. X

      Reply

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Follow Me on Pinterest
              
  • DISCLOSURE
  •             
  • PRIVACY
  •             
  • COPYRIGHT

Help your child be happier, calmer, and more successful at learning and life.

Enter your email below to get the FREE Super Sensory Starter Kit.

To receive the right resources, please tick the box that best describes you:

* By subscribing, you consent to our use of your personal data as per our Privacy Policy, which includes agreeing to receiving interest-based email.

  • About / Contact
  • NurtureStore Supporters
  • Free Play Planner
  • Shop
  • Home
  • Activities
  • Disclosure
  • Privacy & Cookie Policy
  • Copyright
This site uses cookies to deliver our services, analyse site usage, show you ads that might interest you, and provide social media features. By using this site, you are agreeing to our Privacy & Cookie Policy