Dinosaur Party

It's been a few weeks since I have dug into my old photos and party archives to share one of our favorite parties.    There was a time a few too many years ago when my son was really into dinosaurs.  This photo reminds me how fast time really does fly, because that cute little boy in the picture is now bigger than me.    He really wanted dinosaurs at the party, but as we all know real dinosaurs do not exist.  The only way my son could have dinosaurs at the party is if I made them.  I cut out a triceratops and a giant T-rex out of large cardboard.    The triceratops greeted the kids at the front door. 

In the family room the kids  were greeted with a T-Rex that was over 5 feet tall.  Kara was about 3 at the time, and  is posing in this picture to show his height.     I used orange, green and yellow as the color scheme, and hung the streamers vertically.

Each child received a "party hat" that was made out of craft foam.  I made a T-rex, a brontosaurus, and a triceratops in different colors.  

I found large pieces of tan paper and taped them to the back  of my counter.   I then had all the kids draw pictures of their favorite dinosaurs and sign their names.

My son's birthday is at the end of April, and normally we have good enough weather to go outside.  This year it was cold and very rainy.  I had a back up plan though, and made a makeshift  dinosaur dig in the garage.   I found dinosaur skeletons, and buried them in the sand.   The children then pretended to be paleontologists, and searched for bones.  When they found a skeleton, they took it to a cleaning station and used paint brushes to clean off the sand. 

Another game we played was search for the dinosaur eggs.   Each child was given a pair  binoculars made from cardboard tubes to help them in their search. 

Here one of the guests excitedly shows off his eggs.  To make them look like dino eggs, I drew dots on plastic Easter eggs.  

I am not sure where I found this dinosaur game, but we then played ring the dinosaur.   

As a fun centerpiece I made dinosaurs out of an avocado and an eggplant.  I used a carrot and half of green pepper for the tree.

The cake was an erupting volcano with plastic dinosaurs. I do remember having trouble with this cake.  The red lava was supposed to harden but it didn't. One tip to remember, 5 yr old boys do not care about little details so it was not a problem. I do not have pictures of the food we ate that day, but I see cut up veggies in the background.  I think those were 'bronto food'. We probably also had some kind of meat for the carnivorous dinos in the group. 

The birthday boy and all of his dino friends pose with T-rex.