Crafts for Kids - Make a dough faces

Let your imagination run wild - make the craziest and scariest face you can think of, using just dough and a bit of paint.

You will need:

Two cups of plain flour
One cup of salt
One cup of water
A mixing bowl
Card or newspaper
Poster or acrylic paint
PVA glue
An oven. Get an adult to help you!

Method:

* To make a dough face you'll need dough!You'll need two cups of plain flour, one cup of salt and one cup of water to make it. Start by pouring these ingredients into a bowl.

* Next - the messy bit!Use your hands to knead the mixture together. This may take a little while.

* You should end up with a sticky ball like this.If the mixture is too dry add a little more water. Or if it's too wet then add more flour.

* Take about one third of the dough ball and put it to one side. You'll need it later!

* Now put a piece of card or newspaper down to protect the surface you're working on.Throw the ball of dough at the surface so that it lands with a splat!

* Press the dough down with the palm of your hand, so that it's fairly flat.

*Now you need to turn the splat into a face. To do so, you'll need the dough that you put aside earlier. Start to mould the face by poking two holes where the eyes should be, and one for the mouth.

*You can even pull up a nose! Next, add details by using the leftover dough.Add eyeballs, and make sausage shapes for eyebrows and lips.

*Mould and sculpt with your fingers to make crazy expressions and funny shapes.

*You can even use a pencil to indent dots in the eyes and the nostrils! Then you can keep pulling it, twisting it or squeezing it into any expression you want.When you're satisified, you might get something that looks like this!

* For the final stages, you'll need to dry it out. The best way to do this is to get an adult to help you and bake it in an oven at a low heat.Use gas mark 1, or 50°C, for a few hours until the dough goes hard.After you've left it to cool for a bit it will be rock hard and look something like this.

* Then you can paint it whichever way you like - the sillier the better!How about blue for the face? Acrylic paint is good for this - but you can use poster paint if you want to.

*Silver for the eyes and eyebrows, maybe?You don't have to use realistic colours because it all adds to the crazy effect.

* When you've painted the whole thing and it's dry, give it a coat of PVA glue all over.Make sure you get into all of those nooks and crannies.

*The PVA glue dries clear and gives it a great varnished effect. It also strengthens the dough.When you've finished you should end up with something like this. Here I have given glue finishing instead of clear varnish , as it is not advisable for kids to handle such things, glue is always a safe one than a varnish