St. Patrick’s Day Activity for Kids: Make a Blarney Stone

Dry the coffee grounds on a baking sheet before using.  Mix the dry ingredients together and add the water.  Shape into a rock.  Form the rock around a small toy or treasure if you want.  Dry for several days.

We don't drink coffee and I found it impossible to get a hold of used coffee grounds.  I ended up using tea powder, which cost me about a dollar.  It was granulated tea, and worked great.  Maggie's favorite part was mixing the dough.  Even after I set the rocks out to dry, she was gathering up bits of rock dough and making another teeny rock.  We made half of the recipe and shaped the homemade rock dough around some sea shells and a “jewel” made from shiny wrapping paper.

Using the shells was neat, because they left an imprint on the inside of the stone and Maggie recently learned the word ‘fossil.'  I tried to convince her to make a Dinosaur Egg.  She was really excited about the idea, but wasn't willing to sacrifice any of her toy dinosaurs for a couple of days while the rocks dried.

We let our homemade rocks dry in a hot sunny spot (it's nearly summer here) for 2 days before cracking them open.  You can see in the pictures that they were still damp inside.  We tried the only hammer in the house – Pat from Handy Manny.