Rock Painting:
Painted Stones with a Heart or Flower Motif

by Jane Lake

Paint smooth or polished stones to wear as jewelery or use as fridge magnets. The heart motif is perfect for Valentine's Day and the daisy is great for a gift for Mother's Day, but you can use other motifs as well. How about an Easter egg, or a daisy motif for spring, a shamrock for St. Patrick's Day or a bright sun with a "man in the moon" on the back for summer?

Rock Painting on Polished Stones
Materials List:

• polished stones from a dollar store or craft store, or smooth stones from your yard
• paint markers in the colors of your choice. For the hearts, we used white, pink and green.
• fridge magnets or jewelery pins
• glitter glue
• hot glue gun and glue sticks or strong craft glue

Painted Stones
Instructions:

Select stones of a suitable shape for your project. In the photograph, we used stones that were triangular and suitable for using to paint a heart. A round stone would suit a pumpkin design. Irregular shapes might be attractive painted with a bouquet of flowers. Watch for unique shapes that suggest birds, animals or other nature motifs.

Wash the stones in soap and water and dry thoroughly.

Paint the stone in the base colour and let dry.

Optional: define the shape of your design, in this case, a Valentine heart, by outlining with dots or a solid line.

Use a paint pen to create your flower, picture or printed message ("Love" or "Be Mine") in a contrasting colour. Simple ideas, using bright contrasting colors, work very well for this project. Let dry.

If desired, add glitter glue accents. Let dry.

Turn over the stone and use the glue gun or strong craft glue to attach a fridge magnet. Younger children must ask an adult to help before working with a glue gun. A funky alternative would be to glue a jewelry pin on the back of your stone and wear it as cool Valentine's Day pin.

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