Kid’s Crafts: Painted River Rock Garden Markers

Every year we plant a backyard garden and I’m always looking for ways to label and mark my plants. We typically start our seedlings in late March and try to plant them about 6-7 weeks later. While out on a nature walk a few weeks ago we collected some smooth river rocks that we found down by the lake. We brought them home to use in this particular craft project.

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We made this project with a group of 5 to 9 year old’s and they really had a fun time making them. Once gardening season rolls around, I’ll be ready with for it with some new garden markers.

Kid’s Crafts: Painted River Rock Garden Markers

Smooth River Rocks – Variety of Shapes & Sizes
Acrylic Craft Paints
Paint Brush, Water Dish, Paper Towels
Sharpie Markers – Variety Pack of Colors
Clear Acrylic Spray Sealer – Glossy Finish
Old Newspaper

Wash and thoroughly dry all of your river rocks. We did this 2-3 days before sitting down to craft with them.

Lay newspaper down onto your work surface. Using acrylic craft paints, paint the rocks in your desired color. We found it was best to use 2 coats of paint, allowing 30-45 minutes of drying time in between each coat. For this particular set of garden markers our background is done in metallic silver. Let the background color dry thoroughly.

Now it’s time to let the kids get creative. They can use acrylic craft paint or Sharpie Markers to make their designs. As you can see, a black Sharpie Marker was used to write the name of the vegetable/fruit/herb and used again to decorate around the border of the river rock. A very simple design, but you can get as creative and as elaborate as you would like. You’ll want to let everything dry for 1-2 hours.

Take your rocks and newspaper outside. Lay them on top of the newspaper and lightly spray one coat of the clear acrylic sealer on top. Let dry for 1 hour, flip them over and spray the other side. We found it best to repeat this process, so that each side had 2 complete coats of the sealer. This will protect your painted finish from the weather elements. Yes, you can leave them outside all year long!

Additional Tip: We made our river rock garden markers REVERSIBLE. From one year to the next…what we plant into our garden can change. Don’t be afraid to let the kids decorate the opposite side of the rocks too!

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