Air Dry Clay--what am I doing wrong? (CTC)

[tollhousemom]

Ok, with our first air-dry clay project our clay was very wet--I added lots more flour and eventually got it workable.

Today we did the toothpaste/cornstarch/glue/water mix and it was slimy wet! I had to add LOTS more cornstarch than the recipe called for in order to get it to a consistency we could work with. I looked up the recipe online just to compare and all the proportions corresponded to the recipes I saw there. We used Elmer's school glue, regular Crest toothpaste (not gel).

I'm telling you--I am totally craft-challenged!!

Any ideas of what we are doing wrong?

tollhousemom (maybe I need to stick to baking cookies!)

[basesloaded]

I too would like some help on this. I can never get the homemade clay to dry so even though I don't want to give up making it ourselves I am frustrated that it doesn't work out for us so I am about to resort to buying something like Model Magic (suggested by a friend). Hope maybe someone with more experience out there has some great advice .

[birchbark]

FWIW, ours didn't work either.

[Tansy]

I do know that cornstarch and flours are all hygroscopic (Readily absorbing moisture, as from the atmosphere.)
So if its been humid you may find you do not need as much water.

I never make a full recipe and I tend to do the clay by how it feels rather than exactly following. It does take a long time to dry Unless I put it outside in the TX sun...

[Tree House Academy]

I had to add more flour to my son's air dry clay for the tablet/cylinder (haven't gotten to the toothpaste thing yet), but I waited till he was sleeping so he would not know that it was lacking. I think a lot of it depends on where you live...climate/humidity and even room temperature.

[Heather4Him]

I had to add more flour to my son's air dry clay for the tablet/cylinder (haven't gotten to the toothpaste thing yet), but I waited till he was sleeping so he would not know that it was lacking. I think a lot of it depends on where you live...climate/humidity and even room temperature.

Same here! Our 13yodd actually made ours, and it worked well, but she did have to add more flour to it.

[birchbark]

Just wanted to follow up and say that the toothpaste version of the air-dry clay worked great! We just had to be careful not to eat any by accident since it smelled so minty and good.

[Kathleen]

Grant seems to have had really good luck with the clay this year. He really likes making it, but I know we had to experiment a little with it last year in Preparing. We usually only have the gel toothpaste on hand, and that clay didn't dry well last year, so he's only been using the flour kind this year. I'd say it gets easier to make the more times you do it. He's a pro now.

Kathleen

[deltagal]

My son recently did this. His first batch turned our very wet, so he asked me to make the second batch...which I did. I waited to add the water last and I just worked it in gradually until we got a clay that seemed right.

[Matt'sMom]

Ladies,

We have also had a hard time using the recipes for air dry clay. The last time it came up we just used some play dough we had on hand and did not keep the project. It worked very well. One bonus was since my ds becomes so attached to every HOD project we did not have to find somewhere to store another one A while back I bought a tub of air dry clay to have on hand I think it was about $3.50. Last week in unit 7 we used it to make the gemstones for the High priest breast plate. It was so easy!!! We used less thatn a 1/4 of it so we still have plenty on hand for future use. I know it is fun to make things yourself but this is the easy way out. I have also had a friend suggest using cookie dough and then eating your project. How fun would that be?

Durea