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Sunday, July 29, 2012

Treasure Rocks

I made coffee can stilts for L's best friends 4th birthday and not wanting to waste the coffee, I decided to use it to make
treasure rocks to add to the gift.


Treasure rocks are made with coffee dough. Trinkets and toys can be molded inside and then the dough is baked to harden. They look and feel like rocks, but break open fairly easily to reveal their prize inside. I tripled the recipe below to make about 20 rocks. Some for the gift and some for L.

Ingredients
1 cup fresh coffee grounds
1 cup flour
1/2 cup salt
1/4 cup clean play sand
3/4 cup water
toys or trinkets to put inside


How To

Mix all dry ingredients together

  
Add the water until dough is very moldable. Too wet and you won't be able to work with it, too dry and it will crumble. Depending on your results, you can add a bit more flour or water to perfect it.






Mold your small toys/trinkets within the dough. You can leave them outside to dry for a few days OR you can bake them on your oven's lowest setting for a few hours. I baked mine for about 4 hours on 170. Turn them over halfway through.




They really look like rocks!





and of course the fun part is excavating and breaking
 them open to find the treasure!




































For the birthday boy, I packaged the Treasure Rocks in a brown paper bag. I knew I couldn't just hand them a bag of rocks that smelled like coffee, so I thought up a little rhyme to explain them, then printed and stapled this to the bag.



The birthday boy's completed gift




We also made these a few years ago!


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25 comments:

  1. UnknownJuly 29, 2012 at 12:21 PM

    Love this idea and the stilts too...what a wonderful homemade gift...can't wait for our next birthday to make some gifts!

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  2. Natasha Mairs - Serenity YouJuly 29, 2012 at 12:22 PM

    these are great!! pinning!!

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  3. Crystal UnderwoodJuly 29, 2012 at 2:46 PM

    I LOVE this!!! How fun! I can not wait to make some for Rosie and Jewel :)

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  4. deborahJuly 29, 2012 at 5:56 PM

    Oh, this is super cool!!

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  5. Saharamama2July 29, 2012 at 7:04 PM

    can you use 'used' coffee that you have dried out? Such a fun idea!

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  6. GinaJuly 29, 2012 at 7:19 PM

    What a fun idea! I love all of the treasures that you hid inside of them. Can't wait to try them out with my little one! :)

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  7. Maura-LeighJuly 29, 2012 at 8:31 PM

    Awesome! What an incredibly creative idea! May I pin this post?

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  8. fdkljsdflkgjJuly 29, 2012 at 8:49 PM

    Yes! You can use dried used coffee grounds. In fact, if you go to the link above where we made this a few years back, thats how we made it the first time. I'm not a coffee drinker so I actually got used coffee grounds from Starbucks! Maura-Leigh, you may certainly pin this :)

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  9. Susi Minet RahayuJuly 30, 2012 at 12:43 AM

    It's a brilliant idea.

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  10. MireilleJuly 30, 2012 at 9:27 AM

    Fantastic idea! love it!

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  11. UnknownJuly 30, 2012 at 2:27 PM

    oooh fun! I'm working on some dino activities for my little guy...this would be perfect!

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  12. Heather and FamilyJuly 31, 2012 at 12:01 PM

    Is there anything that you should avoid baking in to your treasure stones? Will pretty much any plastic toy hold up? I was kind of thinking of trying to bake dollar bills into them but not sure if that would be smart.

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    Replies
    1. tammyMarch 1, 2015 at 10:41 PM

      Did you ever get a reply to this? I don't see one. I was wondering about toys not holding up.

      Delete
  13. kmAugust 5, 2012 at 10:17 PM

    INCREDIBLE!!!! I've had this recipe waiting dog-eared in one of my kiddo artsy books for a long long time... now that I've seen it in action I can't wait much longer to give it a try! :):)

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  14. UnknownAugust 9, 2012 at 9:49 PM

    I just came across this looking at your blog. LOVE this idea and what a great fine motor skill for the kiddos. My 4 yr old will love this. Thanks for sharing. Just shared on my FB page and pinned this. (Momma's Fun World)

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  15. Anu GaneshAugust 10, 2012 at 1:09 PM

    Bookmarking this!! kudos to your creativity!

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  16. UnknownSeptember 4, 2012 at 9:56 PM

    So glad to make it to your blog! I love this idea especially for our little boy. He likes to destroy things so this would be perfect activity for him. ;)

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  17. Ryan DonovanJanuary 24, 2013 at 10:59 AM

    Your child can be an artist when he grows up. I think even a gold buyer couldn't differentiate his works from real ones. Try to motivate and educate him about art and I'm sure he'll excel in that field.

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  18. LaurenJanuary 27, 2013 at 7:15 PM

    This comment has been removed by the author.

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  19. LaurenJanuary 27, 2013 at 7:15 PM

    Could a younger kid smash these with her hands or are they hard enough to require tools? She's not great with a tot hammer just yet.

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  20. Play Create ExploreJanuary 28, 2013 at 10:00 PM

    Lauren, they actually aren't that tough to break open and stomping on them with shoes on is always fun too :)

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  21. LaurenJanuary 28, 2013 at 10:29 PM

    Great, thanks!

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  22. AnonymousApril 8, 2013 at 8:29 AM

    What kinds of toys do you put inside? Wasn't sure what was actually safe to use! Thanks. Such a cute idea!

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  23. AnonymousMarch 15, 2014 at 2:09 PM

    Do the coffee grounds have to be used?

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  24. UnknownAugust 4, 2014 at 12:04 PM

    Very cool idea!! I'll be using this in a round-up post this week. I can't wait to make my own :-)

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