DIY Painted Kindness Rocks Craft – Inspire Positivity!
Want a fun DIY craft that also incorporates spreading kindness? ❤️
Consider painting rocks with encouraging words on them, either by yourself or as a fun and frugal family activity! Then you can place them in various spots around your community or gift them to friends or family to share in the smiles.
I recently painted kindness rocks with my kids, and we loved it so much! It’s such a fun and easy project to do together.
What is the Kindness Rocks Project?
Meagan Murphy from TheKindnessProject.com is the creator of this popular social movement that encourages a community to connect through positive messages painted on rocks.
The idea is that someone can see this message while outside in their neighborhood, and potentially have it change their entire mood or day.
Here’s your chance to spread some love and kindness around the community in an inspiring way!
Here are my best tips for making DIY painted kindness rocks:
- We have rocks in our yard that were perfect for this craft project, however, you could always go on a nature walk to find some beforehand. Another idea is to purchase smooth flat rocks online via Amazon.com.
- I used acrylic paints we already had on hand and then purchased some oil-based Sharpie paint pens. Those definitely help you create wording and doodles on your rocks easily.
- Sealing the rocks using Mod Podge is an important last step so that your masterpiece will stay on the rock longer.
- For easier clean-up, consider covering your work surface with paper or plastic first before starting this paint project.
DIY Kindness Rocks
PrintSupplies Needed
Directions
1
Go on a hunt to find rocks. Wash and dry them.
2
If you are wanting rocks as a solid color, paint the entire rock and let them dry.
3
Embellish the rocks with doodles, drawings, and encouraging messages. Let dry.
4
Finish by painting rocks using Mod Podge, so that it seals the artwork on the rocks. Allow to dry completely before placing in the yard, in parks, or gifting to family and friends.
I love how anything goes with this project!
There’s no right or wrong way to paint your rocks. It was super therapeutic to just sit down and be creative with the kids for a couple of hours, and something I think you’ll enjoy doing, too.
It’s also fun to go hiking and come across rocks like these outdoors! 🙌
Here’s some more painted rock inspiration from my sidekick Angie, who did this project recently with her family! Her kindness rocks are so cute, too!
Here’s how to paint yourself a cactus rock garden that won’t die!
I’m the leader of our neighborhood rock group. There is maybe 100 of us back here currently painting. I’ve made 1,200 rocks in the last three weeks. I basically eat, sleep, and repeat rocks! Everyone is having so much fun though!
That’s pretty neat you have a group! Love it!
That’s awesome 😍 Our family went to Portland (OR) couple a years back & found some cool painted rocks in a mall My daughter adores ‘em 🥰
You can seal with a spray of poly or sealant also. Just do it outside. At Home Depot, you can buy a huge bag of rocks for about $10. Will last a long time. Also, lots of places have groups. You just put the address on the back of the rock and when someone finds they are supposed to post a picture of the rock and say where found. I actually made little business cards telling people about it and where to post. Then I went south on a “rocking road trip”. I got quite a few post backs!
That’s fun! That’s for sharing those tips 💕
If you’re using spray sealer make sure you use water based markers and not oil based, the chemical reaction in sealer causes oil markers to bleed out. Also contact nursery’s in your area for better rocks than Home Depot or Lowe’s sales. Usually cheaper too. They let me fill a 5 gallon bucket with any size rocks I want for $2 (no tax)
Do anyone know if it’s okay to take a rock? My daughter and I have been painting rocks during these last few weeks of SIP and have left them in various places in our neighborhood. Lately, we’ve seen several of our rocks go “missing” which has been a little sad for my daughter. I tried to tell her to take it as a compliment since someone loved it enough to want to have it. Now she’s asking if it’s okay to take someone else’s rock if she really loves it…Does anyone know what the etiquette is surrounding this? Is it okay to take a rock if you leave a rock? Or should they never be taken so that everyone can enjoy them?
Same thing here, we have made around 50 and all of them have been gone in a day or two. I told my daughter to be happy, people like them and take them, so she’s made someone happy. I think it’s ok to take them as long as it’s one or two and you’re not hoarding them. I’ve also seen people switch them places or put them in their front home.
In our area, if you find a rock, you take it and place it somewhere else for others to find. If there’s an email or # you can see how far your rock has gotten.
Same. Ours is called “Ohio Rocks”. There have been rocks that have ended up all over the country.
If it made your daughter sad to have her rock taken, I’d say don’t take another person’s rock. Just go paint more yourself.
My kids and I have been painting rocks and putting them out in the neighborhood for the past month. People seem to be really enjoying them. We do notice a few have gone missing but my kids think it is fun to see which ones happen to be liked so much that someone takes it. Has actually become a competition which sadly, I am loosing. We recently noticed every time a rock goes missing, a new one which we did not paint, appears! So others have been starting to participate. Makes our family walks exciting. Now, if we really, really like a rock (and all 3 of us have to agree) we will take it, only if we have a new one to replace it with. We also have had people move the rocks around. We don’t mind because then we get to “find” them as well.
My daughter and her friends did this for their last two years of high school. They created a Kindness Week for their school’s Best Buddies program (Best Buddies is an organization that promotes inclusion among students with special needs and their message is Friendship does not need to be complicated! One of the activities for Kindness Week was working with the students with special needs to paint and place positive messages on rocks and together the students passed them out to the student body, teachers and administrators at her high school. It was such a huge success and a great way to promote awareness and kindness. She will be studying Special Education in the fall(she has a brother with cerebral palsy and has always had a passion for helping the special needs community) and plans to share and start a Kindness Week at her college next year.
Thank you for sharing this great idea with others. Kindness is so important and this is a great way to promote it.
I thought the point was for others to take the rocks they find? Our family has been doing this for a couple months and we leave them for others to find and take home if they choose to 🙂
Agreed, Sally, I thought that was the whole point as well. I do like the explanations parents are giving their children as to why their rocks were taken. What an inspiration in these times for youngsters to understand what they are doing makes a difference in someone’s life that they chose their beautiful rock to take to give them whatever hope they may be needing at that particular time in their lives. If I could only be so talented…
You have to use a sealer, mod podge will be tacky if it gets wet. My city has Facebook page to post when you find a rock, special labels we use too so we know how far they travel 😍. People constantly hide them in parks here, families enjoy the hunt and get outdoors.
I loved the idea! In addition to the stones being beautiful in the style of my easy decoration.. it is a great option for group dynamics for children to socialize and exchange ideas! Not to mention the fact that they come into contact with nature!