Have you heard of Story Stones? They’ve been popping up in my Pinterest for a while now. I love that it promotes imaginative play and early literacy! So, during our quick trip to visit family, I insisted we make a stop at a river. Roo and Daddy played in the water, and I collected stones; the smoothest ones I could find, like skipping rocks, and all different shapes and sizes.
If you don’t have access to a river or other place to collect stones, you can always purchase some at your craft store.
In addition to the stones you’ll also need:
Paint
Paint Brushes
Glue
Sequins/Rhinestones/Glitter/any other shineys
Stickers for the artistically challenged/lazy/busy
ModgePodge to seal the paint or stickers and make everything shiny
Make sure your rocks are clean and dry, then decide what to put on the stones. There are so many themed ideas! But I decided to go with a few characters, a place and some weather conditions for Roo’s first set.
Don’t forget to give your child some rocks too!
If left to her own devices, Roo will ALWAYS mix her paint into a muddy mess. Which is fine sometimes. Other times, I know we’ll both be happier with the end product if it’s less muddy. So I give her a palette of paint on a paper plate and choose three to four colors that mix well.
Then I handed her some brushes and let her go to town, she had so much fun and was VERY focused on getting it just so.
I helped her sprinkle glitter on some of the rocks while the paint was still wet, the others we glued rhinestones and placed stickers after they dried.
While we waited for her rocks to dry, I gave her some paper to paint on.
Once everything was dry, we painted on the ModgePodge to seal everything in. This is especially important for stickers, but I liked the shine and extra protection from scratches so we added it to all of the rocks. (Don’t add it to the rhinestones! It takes the sparkle away.)
We both really enjoyed this project. My favorite is that it’s not a useless project that will be thrown away after it’s served its time on the fridge. My stones will act as storytelling prompts, and hers will be treasures to find, or hide, or show off. I can’t wait to make more and add to the story possibilities.
Have you made story stones before? What characters did you decide to use?