Dino-Mite Party Prep

I'm not sure how I came up with the idea of doing a dinosaur themed birthday bash for Callan this year. It happened sometime along the drive to Florida. In fact, I pretty much planned all three birthday parties for the year during our crazy long car trip! Callan was super excited for his party. When he found out we had to reschedule it from his actual birthday to a new date a few weeks later, he was not a happy camper. He kept asking when his party was! The dinosaur party was a grand hit, but I think I enjoyed the planning and prep the most! I LOVE planning parties, coming up with a theme and figuring out all the details. With the party bumped from its original date, I had even more time to prepare, so I probably did more than I would have otherwise. But it was time well spent, and the end result was a perfect party for my little dinosaur lover!

invites from my trusty source--etsy

Knowing there would be about 25 kids running around our small house and backyard, I planned quite a few activities for the kids to do during the party to keep them occupied. To help them keep all their loot organized, I made personalized pails for all the guests. When each guest arrived, they located their pail filled with palentologist "tools" (plastic knives, bowls, and toothbrushes) for fossil digging. After digging for fossils, they used the pails to collect eggs during the dino egg hunt and then for storing their goodies from the t-rex pinata.

Making the dinosaur fossils was a fun activity for the boys and I to do during the week prior to the party. I purchased a bag of dinosaur skeletons from amazon and then set about trying to find a good recipe to enclose them in "rocks." The recipe I found was super easy and dried nicely, although it did take a few days to completely solidify.

Dino Fossils

1 cup sand 

1/2 cup cornstarch

1/2 tsp. cream of tarter

1/2 cup water

Depending on the number of bones you want to cover and how big they are, you may need to double or even triple the recipe. It took 8 cups of sand to cover my 20 skeletons.

ingredients and the first of the finished product

plastic dino skeletons

Mix all ingredients together and heat over medium-low heat. It will be really soupy!

After a few minutes of stirring, it begins to set up and form a dough. Remove from heat, let cool for a few minutes, and then cover each skeleton in the clay mixture. Allow at least 36 hours to dry.

My next project was baking and decorating the dinosaur cookies for the favor bags. I knew I wanted little green t-rexes, but i had no idea how cute they would turn out! For the icing, I used Wilton Candy Melts mixed with 1/4 cup corn syrup to make something called candy clay. It's basically like fondant icing. You just roll it out and use the same cookie cutter to cut out each shape. After pressing it on, I attached a little candy eye and they were all set!

dino cookies wrapped up and ready to go

favor baskets

Check this guy out! As I was searching for ideas online, I came across this awesome dinosaur fruit bowl. I simply had to make him for our party! When I showed Brad, he quickly convinced me that this was a project best left for him, and he was right! I thought he turned out great. Click here for directions.

I was so excited about making these cupcakes, another idea I came up with on the road to Florida. I had made a dirt cake inside a dump truck for Brody when he was two, and it was such a hit that I was looking for a way to do it again. I thought it would be fun to hide gummy dinosaur bones inside a cupcake, fill it with pudding and crushed oreos, and call them dino dig cupcakes! They turned out exactly like I had hoped, and the guests loved them!

using regular chocolate cupcakes, i cut out a hole in the center of each one and placed two gummy bones inside. then i covered in the chocolate pudding mixture, stuck two more bones in the top, and sprinkled all over with crushed oreos.

YUMMY!

Finally, we made this delicous red lava punch, and filled the top of the bowl with dry ice so that it steamed over and looked like real lava. (Thanks to Aunt Bethany for the dry ice idea!) I didn't get a good pic of the steam, but you get the idea!

Pictures from the party coming soon!