Easy Homemade Playdough Recipe (+ FREE Printable Recipe Card)

A printable recipe for playdough is available at the bottom of this post!

I have such fond memories of making playdough with my mom and siblings. We’d watch in anticipation as my mom stirred up the mixture with our chosen colors. After it was done we would take turns tossing it around like a hot potato until it cooled off.

Today I got to do the same thing with my two year old (minus the hot potato game part). We made homemade play dough!

She picked out the colors and I threw together the simple ingredients and stirred up two batches.

It was fun to see her discover how to actually play with it. We used cookie cutters, utensils, toothpicks, and other miscellaneous things I found around the kitchen.

Making your own playdough is SUPER easy. I’m not just saying that. Just mix and stir. Your kids can help until you get to the end when it really thickens up. Want to make your own playdough??

Homemade Play Dough Recipe

Ingredients:

• 1 cup flour
• 2 teaspoon cream of tartar
• 1/3 cup salt
• 1 cup water
• 1 tablespoon vegetable oil
• food coloring

Directions:

Mix all ingredients except the food coloring into a 2 qt sauce pan.

Stir over low/medium heat.

Once it begins to thicken a bit, add food coloring.

Stir until mixture becomes very thick and kind of balls up on its own.

Once it is the consistency you want, remove it from the heat and let cool.

Now let your little ones get their hands all over it!

Oh, and if they decide to eat or lick it, you won’t have to worry. You know what every ingredient in it is!

Thrifty Gift Tip: Our friend, Holli, makes several colors, puts them in small containers (think tupperware or small mason jars) and gives homemade playdough away as gifts as birthday parties. What a cheap and fun idea! You could even add in a fun cookie cutter or two and the recipe card below. I find cookie cutters at garage sales all the time. Just string it through a nice ribbon and tie it to the jar(s) of playdough.

To make this even easier for you to do with your kids or to give away as a gift, I’ve created a printable 4×6 card with this playdough recipe on it. It looks something like this (below) but can be downloaded as a pdf from here: Printable Play Dough Recipe Card

If you like the style of this recipe card, you’ll probably like our Five Printable Home Run Recipes as well!

Enjoy!

Oh, and if you want, add glitter to the mixture to create an extra fun factor!