Rocks are practically everywhere you go; why not make something cute out of them? In the past, people have made a rock into a paperweight and even taken rocks home and called them pets, but this craft mixes the two together and makes some cute rock animal paper weights. Search through your driveway, to find different shaped rocks that will be appropriate for the animal that you have in mind. A turtle, for instance, will require one round rock that’s rounded on top, another rock for the head, a sliver of a rock for a tail, and four small round or oblong rocks for the feet. The rocks should be similar in color if you’ll be leaving them natural, but if you’ll be painting them, any colors of rocks will do.
Wash and dry the rocks thoroughly before starting the gluing process. Use super glue or hot glue to glue the rocks together, making sure that the project sits level after each limb is attached. After the animal is glued together, paint it green, let it dry, and then paint again. After the second coat has dried, draw on brown or black squares across the back. After it is completely dry, set it on a piece of felt that is a similar color. A green turtle will have green felt, a black panda will have black felt, and so on. Draw around the shape, and then cut the felt slightly smaller than the drawing. Glue to the bottom of the animal with white glue or super glue. You can now attach wiggle eyes from a craft store, or even sticker eyes. A mouth can be made from a sliver of red or pink pipe cleaner, or a tiny piece of colored felt. You can also attach eyes, but no nose or mouth. Or, paint a silly face on the animal with a small paintbrush. Make a lady bug similarly, but use black pipe cleaners to make antennae.
You can make giraffes, elephants, kittens, dogs or any other animal, but try to focus on a main feature, such as color, to make the animal stand out. For a giraffe, make sure the rock for the neck is extremely long and the rocks are painted in yellow and brown squares so that people can tell what it is as soon as they see it. The shapes of the rocks are very important too. Looking at a book or magazine while choosing the rocks helps a little with finding the perfect shapes of rocks. You can even make a snake by choosing several rocks of similar size and length, then aligning each one off-center from the previous, to give the curve shape. The felt on the bottom not only further secures the rocks, but also keeps the rocks from scratching desk surfaces. In place of the felt, you can also use a wooden base, a mirror base or a cork base. For any of these, paint the base, paint the rocks, and then attach them directly to the base.
Polished rocks are beautiful, but are a little harder to paint, since the paint doesn’t easily adhere to the rock unless you sand it first. Choose polished rocks which are similar in color to the actual animal, then use antennae, ears and eyes to maximize the look of the animal. Another way to enhance the look is to glue other objects to the rocks. Twist pipe cleaner up in a swirl, and then glue it to the tummy of a panda bear paper weight. Use tiny pink felt ears for a pig paper weight or cut out spots from black felt and glue them to a white puppy.
