Fall is time for celebrations. In Canada, Thanksgiving is just around the corner, so it is time to start looking for crafts to make 🙂

This past weekend, my daughters and I decided to make our own turkey art with clay. Here are the tutorials for two different clay turkeys.

What you need:

– Clay – modelling clay is ideal for children. You can also try to use play dough. We used polymer clay since we plan on having these turkeys baked so they harden.

– Toothpicks – ideal to make little holes and indentations on the clay.

– Patience 😉

Turkey #1

Start with two balls of clay. One slightly smaller than the other. We chose to make them the same colour, but you could try different colours for different looks 🙂

With the help of a toothpick, make a slight indentation on top of the bigger ball.

Roll one of the edges of the smaller ball, until it becomes slightly thinner than the other.

Place the smaller ball on top of the bigger ball, making sure that the thinner end fits into the indentation on the bigger ball.

Make several rolls of clay, in different colours. Make sure that one of the ends is thicker than the other so that it creates the illusion of a feather.

Arrange these “feathers” in a fan shape and flatten them with your fingers.

Attache the “feather fan” to the body of the turkey by gently pressing them together.

Make two tear shaped logs for the wings.

Flatten them with your fingers and attach them to the  body of the turkey.

Make a tiny beak with orange clay and attach it to the face of the turkey.

With the help of a toothpick, make small holes above the beak for the eyes.

Make two tiny white balls and insert them into the eye holes. Flatten them with your fingers.

Make two itsy-bitsy black balls and flatten then on top of the white.

Finally, roll three small red sticks and place them below and on top of the beak, and on top of the head.

Enjoy your little turkey. You could use it as a place marker for Thanksgiving dinner, or you can just use it as a cute decoration for the home 🙂

Turkey#2

Start by rolling a ball of brown clay and then flatten it into a disk. Make sure you flatten a little more on one side so you can fit the head.

Make a smaller ball and flatten it. Place it on top of the first disk.

Make two tear shaped logs and flatten them. Place them on top of the first disk to make the wings.

Make a bigger ball of clay, flatten it, and place it underneath the other pieces, to make the tail. You can trim a little if needed.

Make thin snakes of clay in various colours and decorate the tail of your turkey.

With small logs of red clay, make the wattle and the head snood.

Use orange clay to make the beak and red to make the snood.

With the help of a toothpick, make small little scratches all over your turkey. This texture will lend the illusion of feathers.

Enjoy your cute little turkey. Since it is a flat turkey, you can use it for table seating cards, or you can glue it to a jar lid, a candle holder, etc.

I hope you enjoyed these small tutorials.

Take care,

Catia