Our youngest loves dinosaurs. For his birthday party in the spring, he had a dino excavation party. We gathered horse and cow bones from a friend’s pasture to replicate the dinosaurs. (Ssshh. The party guests had no idea I faked it!) I placed them in the field to look like the dinosaurs had died naturally or as a result of a battle with another dinosaur.
Let’s find some dinosaur bones!
They began in the treehouse with toy binoculars to look for dig sites.
Dig site, ho!
Then they boarded the hay ride for the tour. As tour guide, I described the excavation sites and how the dinosaurs likely died. I loved the look of awe on their faces.
This is the stillest my boys have ever been.
The finale was digging in sand buckets for toy dinosaur skeletons.
Dig for your party favors! Mwahahaha!
Some guests were unable to make it to the party, so I promised them a private tour. We were only able to give one before the pasture got overgrown. (Those goats are NOT earning their keep!) So we had to mow it. Bye bye, dino dig!
My father-in-law mowed around the dinosaur bones the first time. We got lots of cute little hay bales from it. The pasture got really overgrown again, so my dad decided to mow. This time I had to pick up the dinosaur bones.
The grass was really tall!
I use my hayride setup for these things. It’s an old lawnmower without the mowing deck hooked up to a trailer.
After airing up the tire with a portable air compressor, I drove through the jungle to gather the bones.
Katie came to help.
While driving through the tall grass, a snake slithered out of the way. I only saw its dust-colored tail and couldn’t identify it, I stopped and tried to look for it. (It was probably a copperhead.) I didn’t look too hard. The grass was really tall, and copperheads are good at hiding. So I moseyed on.
When I was leaving the pasture, I turned too sharply and lost the trailer. It was too heavy to lift and put back on the ball hitch, so I improvised.
Redneck lever and fulcrum. Y’all thought I was kidding when I admitted to doing this in my last post.
I unloaded the bones and branches into the burn pile just as Dad arrived with the tractor.
Farewell, dinos. We shall cremate you soon.
The pasture is being mowed as I type. It’ll look so much better, but I’ll miss the dig sites.
The dino party was a lot of fun. I love to see awe and wonder on children’s faces. That alone made all of the work worth it. But how am I going to top that next year?
The Misadventures of a Country Mom 