This seems like it should be simple but I can't get it.

QUESTION:

What is the best way to animate an object with it's own "local" animations, and then animate the object globally?

I have a coin-like object. What I want is for it to be slowly spinning in mid-air, and slowly sinking down.

What I've done--which DIDN'T work--is I animated the rotation of the coin first. I went in the hypergraph and looped it, so it spins indefinitely. But then when I try to keyframe the sinking, it errors out somehow. The whole object disappears.

I've tried variations of these processes, including parenting the coin to a separate control object and I'm still screwing something up. I can see how this is something I'll run into again if I don't learn it now. Any help?