Thursday, August 21, 2008

A Fun and Frugal Dino Craft!!



What do you do with all those empty laundry soap bottles hanging around? Throw them away? No! Inside those little bottles is a Dinosaur waiting to be born!

So, We are going to make a dinosaur craft/toy out of a couple of ALL laundry soap bottles! Completely Frugal and completely free, (not to mention better then throwing them away!) Don't think I can? Just wait and see!

First, remove the wrapper of an empty bottle. ANY bottle with a similar shape works great! Wash out the inside really good. (if you don't rinse it out really well you are going to have a BIG mess! Believe me!)
Also, this craft requires parental assistance!!



Next, make 2 marks with a marker like so on both sides of 1 bottle. The top mark is for the arms, the bottom for the legs.


Draw a leg template on a piece of paper. On a 2nd bottle trace the template.


With a craft knife or a good pair of scissors cut out the leg peice, cut out a 2nd from the other side of the bottle. (don't forget to give him a left and right leg! so flip the paper template over!)


OK, with what is left of the 2nd bottle- make a paper arm template, trace and cut.

So, we now attach the arms and legs to the 1rst bottle with the 2 marks. We do this by first drilling a small hole through the leg/arm and body and then drilling a screw. Does it look more like a dinosaur?

Using the remains of the 2nd bottle trace and cut out a tail shape. Screw it on , for extra strength I taped it on too. Although not shown, I also taped this little guys legs too.

The head is up to you! I used more bottle parts and kind of taped it on and"into" a head shape!

OK! Now we are ready to paint! Do whatever you want, or whatever your child wants! This part is more kid-friendly! depending on the paint you use, it will chip off. If you wrap the whole Dino with tape this will be less likely to happen! Glue on some googly eyes for a really great "look!"


So here is the finished project! Isn't he cute???

My little brother, Matt, actually won a contest for "Most Realistic Dino!"

So, start crafting!!

God Bless, Rebecca!

9 comments:

Donna(mom24boyz) said...

what a cool craft--I will have to remember this one when we do a dinosaur study. Way cute!

Julie Willis said...

Pretty neat... now if you could show me how to make a dolly or a chicken! My girls aren't into Dinos but this so neat!!!

Kathy said...

Thanks for dropping by! As for a chicken you could just change the arms for wings and make the legs a little smaller,change head shape a little. Add a chicken tail or craft feathers and there you have a genuine plastic chicken!

We needed a dino for VBS so this worked out great!
God Bless, Rebecca

Teresa said...

This is an awesome idea! I LOVE reusing stuff to make a craft! I'm going to have to try it!

Extraordinary Ordinary Life said...

Too cute! Too bad I don't have any laundry bottles because I make my own laundry detergent, but I could ask family members to save me theirs! Great idea!

Kate @ A Simple Walk said...

Oh my, that is amazing. My 4 year old son will just LOVE this! Thanks so much for sharing.

Brenda said...

That is by far one of the coolest crafts I have ever seen! I can't wait for my detergent bottle to be empty so that I can make one (I mean my kids can make one!)

Sherry @ Lamp Unto My Feet said...

That is too cute!:D

Shynea @ Penny Pinching Diva said...

I have to say that this is a really neat craft project. I have three little boys, and I know for a fact that they would love to make this. Thank you for the idea, I am bookmarking your blog and we will be doing this as soon as I get three small detergent bottle empty.