Valentine Country Heart
Date Submitted: January 08, 2007
These cute country hearts are easy and fun to make using salt dough. 
Materials:
- Baking parchment
- Gold paperclips
- Red raffia
- Acrylic paints
- Paint brushes
- Polyurethane varnish
- Rolling pin
- Small sharp knife
- Baking tray
- Pencil
- Scissors
- 2 cups flour
- 1 cup salt
- 1 Tbsp vegetable oil
- 1 cup water
Making the Salt Dough
Mix together the flour and salt in a mixing bowl. Mix the water and oil together. Add half the water mixture to the flour and salt. Kneed the mixture, gradually adding more of the water/oil mixture until the dough has a smooth, firm consistency. Be careful not to add too much water or the dough will sag and become sticky.
Remove the dough from the bowl and continue to knead for 10 minutes. Let the dough rest for 30 minutes in an airtight container. Making the Heart
Print the pattern above and cut out. Roll out the dough on baking parchment to ½ - inch thick. Cover the dough with the pattern and using a sharp knife cut out the heart. Mark the squares with a pin. Moisten your fingers and smooth the edges of the heart. Indent lines on the heart, following the pin marks, leaning the knife first towards you then away.
Cut a paperclip in half and insert it into the top of the heart. Make more hearts in the same way. Baking
Place the hearts on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper. Bake for about 2hr at 275 degrees. Allow to cool. Finishing
When pieces have cooled, paint the heart red leaving alternate squares plain. Allow paint to dry. Seal with five coats of varnish. Thread some raffia through the paperclip loop and tie in a bow.
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