Easy No-cook Sand Playdough Recipe.

This sand playdough recipe makes a super fun, squishy, and textured playdough that is perfect for beach and ocean themed playdough activities.

sand play dough

This sand play dough recipes doesn’t need to be cooked, so it is quick and easy to make, and something a little different than the usual play dough.

Adding the sand gives the dough an interesting texture. It’s gritty and squishy, and so much fun to play with.

It would be great for ocean, beach or mermaid themed playdough activities. But it’s also fun to play with all on it’s own.

Just add a few sea or beach themed items such as, shells, sea glass, or sea creatures, and your kids will be happily playing with this sand dough for hours.

sand play dough with shells, fish and gems

How to Make Sand Playdough

You’ll need some beach sand, or play sand to make this sand dough. Avoid using ‘craft sand’ or kinetic sand, as the results will not be the same.

Because sand is different depending on where it comes from, we’ve listed a minimum amount in the recipe below, but you’ll probably need to add a little more as you mix the dough together to get it to right consistency.

sand play dough surrounded by sea creatures and other items

Store the sand playdough in an airtight container or zip lock bag (squeeze out as much air as possible) and it should keep for a few weeks. If you find it is getting too dry add a tiny bit of water, if it is getting sticky add some more flour or sand.

sand play dough

Easy No-cook Sand Playdough Recipe.

Yield: Enough Playdough for 1-2 children
Prep Time: 5 minutes
Total Time: 5 minutes
Difficulty: easy

This easy, no-cook, sand playdough recipe makes a super fun, squishy, and textured playdough.

Materials

  • 1 cup plain (all purpose) flour
  • 1 cup sand
  • 1/4 cup salt
  • 1 tbsp cream of tartar
  • 1 tbsp oil
  • 3/4 cup hot water.

Instructions

  1. Place the flour, sand, salt and cream of tartar into a large bowl and mix with a fork.
  2. Add the oil and water and mix well until the mixture forms a dough.
  3. Knead the dough, adding more sand if needed, until the mixture is soft and squishy, but not sticky.

Notes

This sand playdough will keep in an airtight container for 2-4 weeks.

sand play dough with shells and other accessories

Oceans Play Dough Mats and Accessories

Now that you have some squishy sand playdough you need these fun printable ocean playdough mats and accessories to go with it!

ocean playdough mats

We used our sand playdough along with the ocean playdough mats and printable accessories. It was perfect for making sandcastles!

This set of ocean play dough mats and accessories includes six fun ocean themed play dough mats, that are open-ended and designed as a prompt, plus three pages of printable play dough accessories.

Check it out in our shop, or use the ‘buy it now’ button below to pop it straight into your shopping cart, and help support Picklebums.

On sale now for $3.99

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4 Comments

  1. I did this recipe and for some reason my dough molded in less than week?
    Does this happen to you, should I try and refrigerate it?
    I loved the feeling of it, thank you for your post!

    1. Because this is a no-cook dough you don’t heat the dough which kills mold spores so the playdough can go moldy, sometimes it just depends on your situation. Adding sand to the playdough also adds in an extra possibility of mold spores, so you could try heating the sand in a low oven for an while before adding it to kill of any extra mold. You could also try adding a little extra salt, and making sure your playdough mixture is not too wet (add extra flour if needed).
      Make sure you store it in a sealed, airtight container (a snap lock bag with all the air squeezed out is a good option), and that it is not overly wet when you store it. Storing in the fridge won’t stop some molds developing so I’d try the other options first. Hope that helps.

  2. Does it dry out if you leave it out? I would like my grands to be able to make mementos of our beach vacation using this with shells, sand glass, etc. from the beach.