A DIY rock cactus is so fun and easy to make from supplies you might already have on hand
– 5-10 larger river rocks
– Green acrylic paint (2-3 different shades)
– Paint brushes
– White paint marker
– Dark green permanent marker
– Plant pots
– Handful of used plastic grocery sacks (not shown)
– Small river rock
– Hot glue and gun
Optional
– Googly eyes
– Faux pink flower(s) or pom poms
– Pink acrylic paint and a faux flower in any color
– Green balloon with the bottom cut off
My daughter and I started by painting the rocks with two quick coats of the green paint. We decided to do five different cactus style at the same time, so you might need to paint more or less rocks depending on how many plants you want to make.
We did most of them in a solid color, but decided to paint stripes on some others.
Once the rocks were dry we laid them all out together and then started to divide them up into different DIY rock cactus groups.
Next we I took our white sharpie pen and drew some cactus-like patterns on them. Stars and polka dots seemed to work best for me.
For a few of them we used our hot glue gun to draw a texture on the rocks before painting. This gives a fun 3D texture that is paintable.
Once the white paint quickly dried, we took the pots and stuffed the bottoms with handfuls of plastic grocery bags.
This fills up the space and lets you get away with only using a handful of small river rock on the tops in each pot. It also keeps the cactus lightweight.
We began to layer the rocks into the pots until I was happy with their placement.
Here is how two of the DIY rock cactus plants looked.
We decided that the simple single cactus needed a pink flower and that the both pots needed a paint dipped look, so we painted a two faux flowers that I found around the house pink and taped off the pots and painted them as well.
We did the same thing on a couple others with pink pom poms.
Finally, we hot glued the flower to two of the cactus plants, and bam…we had our very own DIY cactus rock garden.
It was a fun touch to hot glue the googly eyes to a couple of the DIY cactus rocks and add a smile too.
Those are my daughter’s favorites and are named Bob and Bobbie. 🙂
Here’s a trick that might come in handy … if you’re out of green paint, but have a green balloon, you can simply cut the bottom off of the balloon and wrap in around your rock.
The bottom of the balloon will be hidden when the rock is placed in your pot.
We did this and then my daughter drew stars with a dark green permanent marker for some texture.
You can also wrap the bottom of a pot with a different balloon for a pint dipped look. We did this with a yellow balloon – so quick and easy!
What do you think? Will you give this DIY rock cactus project a try? The results are super cute.
I love that they bring a pop of color to our day. they look great in Vivi’s bedroom.
