Make a clay footprint ring dish in the shape of a butterfly - what a beautiful keepsake! Follow our easy step by step instructions to learn how to make a diy butterfly clay bowl from air dry clay. It is so much easier to make this clay craft than it looks! With this handmade keepsake or homemade gift you can treasure a baby or toddlers little footprints forever. Older kids could even design and make their own clay dish!
We love diy keepsakes and have lots of clay and salt dough crafts that we have made over the years. We especially love anything that involves tiny handprints or footprints. These homemade crafts make such lovely gifts for parents and grandparents as they are a great way of capturing a baby or toddlers tiny prints.
Last year Daisy (aged 2) made a clay footprint bowl in the shape of a heart. I treasure this footprint bowl and I love how easy it was to make. I wanted to make something similar with Oliver's (aged 2 months) feet using the same air dry clay.
Not wanting two identical bowls I decided to make a different shaped clay dish using Oliver's footprints. Oliver 'helped' me to make a clay footprint ring dish in the shape of a butterfly that looks equally adorable. I will treasure both of these clay jewellery dishes as they are wonderful keepsakes and I have them on display side by side. We have also since made clay baby footprints as a heart dish, a cute clay cat craft and a unicorn air-dry clay bowl.
As well as making footprint bowls we have made a clay hand shaped ring dish as well as a handprint bowl from salt dough. I told you we loved keepsakes! These little handprint and footprint crafts are always really popular when they are given to family as gifts, the grandparents love them!
Below are some easy step-by-step instructions to show you how to make an easy clay footprint ring dish in the shape of a butterfly. This beautiful footprint butterfly poem would be perfect to go with this rainbow footprint butterfly craft if you are making it as a gift.
Related - Footprint Art
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Clay Footprint Ring Dish - Footprint Butterfly
Footprint Clay Bowl - Supplies:
Click on the links to purchase the supplies
- Air dry clay
- Rainbow ink pad
- Gold acrylic paint
- Craft wire
- Rolling pin
- Chopping board (or other hard surface)
- Sharp knife
- Small bowl
The ink pad suggested above is the perfect size for a babys footprint. If you are doing this craft with an older child you will need to buy a bigger inkpad or paint the footprints once the bowl has dried.
Clay Footprint Ring Dish Keepsake - Butterfly Design
Step 1 - Getting prepared
If you are making this footprint craft with a baby it is important that before you start you make sure that your baby is happy, fed and comfortable. Your baby won't be pleased about having their footprints taken if they are hungry or tired and you will end up with an upset baby and smudged footprints!
I find that lying Oliver (2 months) on his play mat keeps him distracted while I take his footprints, he does quite like me taking his footprints anyway though which is lucky!
Make sure that you have the clay, ink and some wipes to hand so that once you start taking the footprints you won't need to move until you have finished.
Step 1 - Rolling out the clay
You need to make sure that you have a hard, flat surface to roll out the clay on. We used an old chopping board with a sheet of baking paper on top. Rolling the clay out on baking paper makes it easy to move the clay around and avoids it sticking.
Roll the clay out until it is about 1cm thick and large enough to fit 2 footprints on (with a little space around the edge).
Step 2 - Making a footprint butterfly in clay
You can make the footprints in two ways. You can either use an ink pad to add colour straight to the clay as we did or you can make an imprint in the clay with your child's foot and then paint it later (like we did when making our footprint heart bowl).
I love the rainbow ink pad that we used to make our rainbow footprint butterfly which is a perfect size for a young babies footprint. For older babies or toddlers you would need a bigger ink pad.
If using ink to make your footprints on the clay press you child's foot firmly onto the ink pad and make sure that you are happy with the coverage.
Then press your child's foot onto the clay. Press firmly to make sure that you have a good imprint. You will need to gently press on each toes before removing your child's foot.
To make a footprint butterfly you need to make sure that the outer edge of your child's feet are next to each other. Leave a small gap between the footprints.
Step 3 - Cuttting the clay
Once you are happy with the footprints it is time to cut the clay. Take your time with this step as it is important to get the shape right.
Using a sharpe knife carefully draw a butterfly shape around the edge of the footprints. Leave a little border around the edge and made sure you leave a little bit of clay in the centre for adding wire antennae.
When you are happy with the shape that you have drawn with the knife press a little harder and cut the butterfly shape out of the clay.
If there are any rough edges smooth over them with your fingers. Adding a little water to your fingers may help.
Step 4 - Adding antennae to your clay butterfly
To make the antennae cut off a small amount of craft wire and curl it into a spiral shape. Make two and try and make them a similar size and shape.
Add the antennae to the clay butterfly by carefully pushing the end of the wire into the middle of the butterfly.
Step 5 - Making a ring dish from clay
Now you have made your footprint butterfly from air dry clay it is time to turn it into a dish shape, (if you want to! The clay footprint butterflies look quite cute as they are!)
You need to find a small bowl that your footprint butterfly will fit inside. The bowl will be used as a mould. Place the clay butterfly inside the bowl and gently press it down so it touches the bottom and sides of the bowl. As the clay butterfly dries it will take on the shape of the bowl.
Leave the clay dish to dry for a day or two and then carefully remove it. If the bottom of your clay dish is still not dry turn it upside doen and leave it for another day or so.
TIP- Cover the bowl with a layer of clingfilm before adding the clay butterfly as it will make removing the clay dish easier.
Step 6 - Painting the clay footprint ring dish
This step is entirely optional. The butterfly ring dishes look beautiful if you leave them with the white air dry clay showing around the edges, but we decided to add a bit of golden paint to make the footprints really pop out.
If painting your ring dish carefully paint around the edge or each footprint being extra careful around each toe. We used gold acrylic paint.
Your clay footprint ring dish is now complete! Any jewelry will look beautiful in this adorable butterfly shaped dish. We made our footprint butterfly dish using baby footprints so it is really small and delicate, it is the perfect size for a few rings! If you have made your clay ring dish using a toddlers feet it will of course be bigger so could be used for larger pieces of jewelry.
Gift or Keepsake
This homemade clay bowl made from your childs footprints would make a beautiful keepsake to be treasured forever. I totally love ours!
It would also be lovely to make a footprint ring dish with your baby or toddler as a gift for a grandparent or other family member (or drop a few hints for someone to make one for you for Mother's day!)
We hope you have fun making your clay footprint ring dish. It makes such a beautiful homemade keepsake and butterfly crafts are perfect to do during the spring and summer months. We also made a rainbow footprint butterfly using paint that we framed which looks equally as adorable (that one was for grandma!)
If you have made this craft with a toddler or preschooler they might like to try a few more butterfly crafts. We have some butterfly colourings and a moving butterfly that they might like to try. We also have a bug and butterfly activity calendar full of 31 bug and butterfly themed activities to try!
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