Looking for a fun and simple project to do with the kids that’s truly frame-worthy? Create a funky pebble portrait of your family, friends and pets to display on the wall or give as a gift. Pebble portraits are easy and inexpensive to make.
My kids each took a different approach to collecting stones and natural elements — my son just grabbed handfuls of rocks and sticks to sort through later, while my daughter carefully selected stones to be used for specific body parts and background designs. Flat, smooth stones were the easiest to use and stack as needed, and also ensured that they would adhere well to the cardstock we used for the background.
I grabbed a couple of old frames I had kicking around and we simply removed the glass to create our 3D art. A shadow box frame would work equally well. There’s no wrong way to create your pebble family and pets, so have fun playing with different designs and elements.
What you’ll need:
— Rocks of varying sizes. Small, flat rocks work best for glueing and stacking
— Natural elements like small twigs, greenery, leaves, bark and more
— Frame or shadow box
— White cardstock for background
— Hot glue gun
Directions & Tips:
Collect your stones and natural elements, like sticks, leaves, moss and bark. Decide if you want a more whimsical portrait with various colors and sizes, or if you want to keep each rock person in a similar tone and shape.
Decide if you’re going to use a regular frame without the glass or a shadow box, and determine the size of your picture. We used a mat in the frame to give it a more polished look and taped those together to help define the space as we planned our pictures.
Arrange (and rearrange) your portrait until you’re ready to hot glue the stones in place.
We found that hot glue dries very quickly on rocks, so be ready to stick as soon as you apply the glue. For any extra elements like the cat’s tail and ears, a fine point marker works well. Frame your final design and display!