Today was the big push for making the dinosaur kits to hand out for the trick-or-treaters. Originally, we were going to do 2 days to get the 400 kits done (200 for trick-or treaters, 200 for my mom's science program), but we ended up doing 200 in 2 hours, so we (perhaps foolishly) pressed on and went for the whole 400. My friend Soryda came towards the end and helped revived us a bit, so the last couple batches weren't nearly as backbreaking. I'm kind of glad we went ahead and did them all--I forgot how sore you get afterwards from the bending moving of these bits of plaster and sand when you pop them out of the mold to dry, or turn over to 'bake'. The recipe is pretty simple--2 cups of play sand, 2 cups plaster, 6 cups vermiculite--makes about 12-15 depending on your mold. Mix ingredients (with heavy gloves--the vermiculite is terrible on hands) with water until the consistency of slightly watery oatmeal. Drop a handful into molds/containers, add a dino, cover him up with a little more, set out to dry. Pop out of mold/container to fully dry each side. I left these out in the hot sun for a few days in a crate stacked with newspaper in between to really dry them out as much as possible. This is important, because if you put them away even a little wet, they'll turn moldy on you; which is a situation devoutly to be avoided, cause the smell? Just awesome. We had it happen one year. Lesson. Learned.
Today was the big push for making the dinosaur kits to hand out for the trick-or-treaters. Originally, we were going to do 2 days to get the 400 kits done (200 for trick-or treaters, 200 for my mom's science program), but we ended up doing 200 in 2 hours, so we (perhaps foolishly) pressed on and went for the whole 400. My friend Soryda came towards the end and helped revived us a bit, so the last couple batches weren't nearly as backbreaking. I'm kind of glad we went ahead and did them all--I forgot how sore you get afterwards from the bending moving of these bits of plaster and sand when you pop them out of the mold to dry, or turn over to 'bake'. The recipe is pretty simple--2 cups of play sand, 2 cups plaster, 6 cups vermiculite--makes about 12-15 depending on your mold. Mix ingredients (with heavy gloves--the vermiculite is terrible on hands) with water until the consistency of slightly watery oatmeal. Drop a handful into molds/containers, add a dino, cover him up with a little more, set out to dry. Pop out of mold/container to fully dry each side. I left these out in the hot sun for a few days in a crate stacked with newspaper in between to really dry them out as much as possible. This is important, because if you put them away even a little wet, they'll turn moldy on you; which is a situation devoutly to be avoided, cause the smell? Just awesome. We had it happen one year. Lesson. Learned.
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