Valentine's Play Dough Tutorial

Snuggle Bunny's school Valentine party is coming up and I was in charge of the goody bags for this party.  I'm one of 3 room moms and we rotate who does what for each party.  The Winter Party I was in charge of the craft and we decorated gingerbread men.  Valentine's Day is the only holiday that is recognized at the school with a party.  We can't mention Halloween at the "Autumn Party," Christmas at the "Winter Party," or Easter at the "Spring Party" even though those holidays happen to fall suspiciously at the time of the parties.  That means no skeleton plates, reindeer crafts, or bunny stickers.  Valentine's Day being the only recognized holiday meant that I could go nuts with hearts, and X's and O's for the goody bags.

I started with all the typical stuff you might find in a generic goody bag:  themed pencils, erasers, stickers, temporary tattoos, suckers, etc.

I then added m&m filled waxed paper hearts from this tutorial from Random Thoughts of a Supermom.  As soon as I saw her post back in January, I bookmarked it right away, knowing that I'd use it in the future.

I then added some homemade play dough.  If you've never made your own play dough before, stop buying the stuff at the stores, because this is so easy.  Note:  even though this is a gluten-free website, this is not a gluten-free dough.  A.P. flour costs way less than gf flours and this is play dough that will be going to gluten eating children(as a room mom, I know who has allergies, etc.)  I started by combining 2 cups of all purpose flour, 1 cup of salt, and 1 1/2 tbsps cream of tartar in a medium saucepan.

I added 2 cups of water, 1/4 cup of vegetable oil, and several drops of red food color over medium low heat.  If you'll be making several colors of play dough don't add the food color yet.

I mixed the ingredients constantly until a dough was formed.  You'll know when it's the right consistency when it's hard to mix with a spoon or rubber scraper.

Dump it out on the counter and after it's cooled a bit, knead it a few times.  If you are making several colors of dough, you can divide the dough into ziplock baggies and add a couple drops of food color per bag and mix it up then.  I rolled the dough out into a generous thickness

and cut the dough into heart shapes.

After popping out each heart,

I wrapped the play dough heart with plastic wrap.

I printed out Play Dough labels,

and after cutting out the labels, I attached them to the wrapped play dough heart with glue dots.  I love using glue dots for projects like this where white glue is too messy and a glue stick won't hold well enough.

I'm not sure if my goody bags are done, or if I'll be adding a cake pop to them.  I've been thinking about making this cake pop rose ever since I saw them on Sweet Cheeks Tasty Treats back in January.  What do you think?  Is there enough in the goody bags, or should I add a cake pop, too?

Thanks for popping in and crafting with me.  I'm sharing this at Just a Girl's Show and Share Day.

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