The von Brueckwitz boys really rock. The Cape Coral brothers and their mother paint kindness rocks that they leave around town. They have been doing this for two years and have seen their rocks end up around the country and even overseas.
Andrea Stetson
Sebastian, Benjamin and Dominic von Brueckwitz, ages 8, 3 and 6, paint rocks in their Cape Coral home.
Mom Lisa Brandt says she gets even more out of it.
“I get to spend time with my boys,” Lisa says. “I get to see their imaginations.”
Her sons, Sebastian, 8, Dominic, 6, and Benjamin, 3, enjoy rock painting.
“Painting rocks is fun,” Sebastian says. “You get to paint something new that you never painted before. We hide them, and people get to find them.”
“My thing I like about painting rocks is because people like our rocks when we paint them, and people have to find them,” Dominic adds.
It all began two years ago.
“I took the boys to Dinosaur World in Lakeland and we were checking out the ducks when I saw this painted rock,” Lisa says. “I hadn’t ever heard of the painted rocks. I thought it was so beautiful. I took it home and two weeks later I heard about rock painting and I thought it was so cool.”
So she and her sons started making kindness rocks. Lisa laid a red cloth on the kitchen table, got a basket full of acrylic paint and some brushes and bought some smooth white rocks. Then the boys started painting.
On the back of each rock, Lisa signs it, “Mom and Sons.” She also adds a message asking the finder to go to the Cape Coral Rocks Facebook group and post where the rock is headed. She has heard of their rocks traveling to Wisconsin, Tennessee, Alabama, Oregon, New York, Delaware, Indiana, Ohio, New Jersey, Colorado, Arizona, Canada and Germany. The Facebook group now has nearly 11,000 members.
Most of the rocks she and her boys paint are left in Jaycee Park in Cape Coral or by Walmart. She also takes some with her when she travels to places such as Daytona or Italy.
Lisa loves hearing stories about how the rocks end up with certain people.
Andrea Stetson
Sebastian von Brueckwitz, 8, paints a candle on his rock. Sebastian and his two brothers paint kindness rocks that they leave around town.
“One of my favorite stories is about Sebastian. He painted a rock a solid blue with a five on it,” Lisa relates. “We set it out at Four Freedoms Park and a few days later a lady and her friends posted and wrote, ‘We are going to be hiding all of these again except No. 5 because it is special to us because we lost our 5-year-old son.’ They were taking No. 5 back home with them.”
Lisa has also painted special rocks for the family of Layla Aiken who died last year at her school bus stop after being hit by a car. She painted another rock for the best friend of Alana Tamplin who was killed walking home from a school bus stop.
Most of the rocks are painted and hidden as Lisa and her sons hope to spread kindness and see how far their rock will go.
“When I go out on errands, I will put them out,” Lisa says. “A few weeks ago, I put one of Benjamin’s in a flowerpot right outside the door of Walmart, and it was posted that they were taking it to Germany.”
Lisa and her sons also enjoy finding the rocks that others leave.
“We take them home and enjoy them for a few days and then set them back out somewhere,” Lisa says.
On a recent morning, Sebastian was painting a candle, Dominic drew a snail and Benjamin painted a heart.
Lisa takes photos of each boy’s artwork and then the family heads out to hide the rocks around town, hoping to brighten someone’s day.
“It’s to make other people happy,” Dominic says.
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Andrea Stetson
Lisa Brandt helps her three sons, Sebastian, Benjamin and Dominic von Brueckwitz, ages 8, 3, and 6, paint kindness rocks.
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Andrea Stetson
Benjamin von Brueckwitz, 3, paints a heart on a rock in his Cape Coral home.
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Andrea Stetson
Dominic von Brueckwitz, 6, paints a snail on his rock. The kindness rocks that he and his two brothers paint are left around town for people to find.