Awesome Dinosaur Pinata

Prepping for ZB's 4th birthday party was lots of fun!  She insisted that a pinata was essential for the party, and wanted it to be chicken shaped.  On the first day of construction, she changed her mind and wanted it to be a dinosaur.  She chose an apatosaur, and we started construction!

First the balloon and newspaper inner structure were built, then the first layer of goopy paper mache.  I know there are fancier ways to do this, but I stayed old school with newspaper and a basic flour/water glue.

After it dried overnight, ZB decided it needed "thorns" (spikes).  So these were added.  They are the dividers from egg carton.

One more layer was added that day, and left to dry.  When it was all dry the next day, we stuffed it full of treasures (kazoos, dark chocolate squares, gummy snacks, magnifying glasses, etc.)  Then time for the first layer of paint.  ZB decided it was to be purple.

Details were added:

On her birthday eve, when she was tucked in bed, B blew up all the balloons, and we set the finished dino in the balloon jungle as a fun wake-up surprise (she was quite delighted by the scene)!