Our stepping stone kit is fairly easy to put together once you get it home. The basic steps are to mix up your cement, arrange your design and let it dry.
You’ll need to find somewhere to work where you won’t mind mixing cement and water. This isn’t a inherently messy process but messes happen. Putting down some plastic or newspaper makes for easy clean up too. You can do it in the kitchen or you can do it in the yard.
Mixing Your Cement
The first step in completing your stepping stone is to mix up the cement. The process is fairly easy and straight forward. Your kit comes with a bag of cement and a tin pan. We’ll use the tin pan to mix the cement.
- Empty the entire contents of the cement bag into the tin pan.
- Add 1 cup of water to the cement
- Mix the water and cement with your hand until its smooth. All the cement should be wet, no clumps.
- Smooth out the cement and gently shake the tin pin from side so its flat. Lift the tin pan slightly off your work surface and gently drop it to get any air bubbles out. No need to drop if far, just enough so the air bubbles come to the top and pop. It may take a few tries to get them all.
Design and Build
Here’s the fun part. Your kit comes with a set of mosaic pieces we made by hand right in our studio. Arrange the pieces in the design you selected and then gently push them into the cement. Sometimes we’ll wiggle the pieces a little as we’re pushing. The top of each piece should be even with the top of the cement. Once they pieces are in just let them be.
Drying Your Stepping Stone
Now that all the work is done, here’s the hard part, you’ll have to keep your new stone in the tine container a good 3 to 5 days it to completely dry and harden. Cement goes through a hydration process where the the calcium and other materials in the cement react with the water to bind everything together. Seems like magic but its really chemistry. In any case, that takes time. As the stepping stone drys its a good idea to pour a little water on it to help it cure. Once the stone is completely dry, take it out of the tin and put it in your garden.