DIY Dinosaur Eggs to Hatch

Set the scene for imaginative pretend play with these DIY Dinosaur eggs – with tiny dinos to “hatch” inside!

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I came up with this fun dinosaur pretend play idea while Mike was out of town on a business trip. I like to find fun things to do when Mike is out of town, and these DIY dinosaur eggs were definitely a hit! This idea was inspired by a book Parragon Books sent us: 1000 Extreme & Extraordinary Dinosaur Facts. This book is full of all sorts of amazing facts about all the different dinosaurs in the world. It’s a pretty cool book, and it renewed my kids’ interest in dinosaurs.

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DIY Dinosaur Eggs

I took four of our plastic dinosaurs and covered them with Crayola air-dry clay one evening after the kids were asleep. I set them on top of the fridge to dry for a couple of days, and then hid them in our container garden out on our patio while the kids were at school.

The kids’ reaction when they came home was priceless – especially Lily’s! I’m pretty sure that she thought I had REAL dinosaur eggs there for a second!

The clay was dry on the outside, but still kind of soft on the inside, making it easy for the kids to “hatch” their dinosaurs.

I put a different dinosaur in each egg, and I wasn’t sure how the kids would roll with that. Would they want someone else’s dinosaur? As it turned out, they were each so thrilled with “their” dinosaur, and they had so much ownership of it after “hatching” it that they didn’t even think about what kind of dinosaur the other kids had. It reminded me of how new parents always think their baby is the most perfect baby on earth. :)

These little hatched dinosaurs proved to be a wonderful source of inspiration for pretend play! They gathered leaves that had fallen off of our fig tree and used them along with the remains from the dinosaur shell (Crayola white air drying clay is a natural white earth clay, so no trouble to have lying about outside)

This simple DIY project made for an absolutely magical afternoon. All four kids were playing so happily together that I even let them stay up a little bit past their bedtime. It was worth it. They got in bed quickly when I asked and fell into contented slumber right away.

Have you ever made dinosaur eggs? What did you use?

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