DIY Painted Stone Garden Markers
Kids will love painting rocks for friends and family in this DIY Painted Stone Garden Marker activity. A great way to let kids explore their own creativity and contribute their own artistic touch to the outdoor living space.
Ingredients
- Newspaper
- Smooth flat rocks of various sizes
- Clean paint brushes
- Paint trays
- Tempera or Acrylic paints (see notes)
- Acrylic paint pens (optional-recommended only for adults and older children)
- Outdoor varnish
Instructions
- Find a safe working space, either indoors or outdoors. If you are painting with young children, I highly recommend setting up outdoors and dressing your children in play clothes that you don't care about.
- Cover a table with newspaper or craft paper and pick desired paints. Depending on how detailed you prefer your rocks to look, you will likely need to work in layers, waiting for each previous layer to dry before moving on to the next (this is the hardest part).
- For these rocks I used acrylic paint pens as they dried the fastest, making this a one-day project instead of two or three. However, this takes some practice and has limitations. For Octavian, I allowed him to go crazy with acrylic paints as that is what I had on hand.
- Once you have finished painting the rocks and the paint has dried, spray with the varnish according to instructions and allow varnish to try completely.
Notes
Paint types- if young children under two (or children who like to put paint in their mouth) will be participating in this activity, I recommend that they use tempera paint, as it is least toxic and totally kid safe. For older kids and adults, acrylic paint is best. Take note that these paints are water soluble and will require an outdoor varnish to seal the paint and prevent chipping. Always spray the varnish outdoors.
