Rawr Dinosaurs! {DIY Dinosaur Costume}

My son is obsessed with dinosaurs. He’s loved them ever since he was introduced to Dinosaur Train on PBS Kids shortly before his second birthday. I thought it’d be fun to try and design a simple dinosaur costume for him to wear whenever he wanted around the house. I didn’t want to spend too much money so I used simple materials I already had and some sponges I picked up on a recent shopping trip. I got the idea from Rookie Mom by doing a simple search for DIY Dino costumes and just adjusted it to fit a two year old. For his 3rd birthday I might attempt to make this Buddy the Dinosaur costume (the no-sew option)… maybe.

If you want to make your own DIY Dinosaur costume just follow these simple steps below.

How to make a DIY Dinosaur Costume

What You’ll Need:

• 3-4 sponges (approx 4 1/2″ long)
• coordinating ribbon
• hot glue gun
• needle & thread
• hooded sweater
• matching sweatpants

What You Do:
1. Cut the sponge in half lengthwise (from A to B). Then cut the sponge again diagonally (from C to A and from D to A). You should have 4 semi-equal triangles.

2. Get out the ribbon and pull it out on a flat surface. Line up the sponge triangles right next to it so you can place them down right after you add the hot glue to the ribbon.

3. Apply a small line of hot glue on the ribbon and place the sponges longest side down on the glue. Press down to make sure the sponge adheres fully.

4. To guesstimate how long the spikes should be use your hooded sweater as a template. Once you get a good length (3 sponges were perfect for my 2.5 year old) cut the ribbon.

5. To attach the ribbon and sponges to the hoodie you can do a few things. The easiest would be to use safety pins to secure the spikes to the sweater. You can also use velcro, snaps, hot glue, tacky glue, etc to adhere the spikes. I chose to hand sew the spikes on since a. my son is pretty close to outgrowing this jacket and b. he’ll be using it to play in, it won’t be used just one time.

6. Sew the spikes at the end of each triangle (where a small amount of ribbon can be seen) with 2-3 stitches. Tie each off securely with a good knot and move on to the next gap in spikes. You should have a small tail dangling from the bottom of the hoodie. A great length to leave it at would be about knee to calf length on your child.

7. To complete the costume I added some green mittens on my son’s hands and put large blue socks over his shoes. I was considering making some toenails out of yellow felt to add to the socks so he has a complete costume but I haven’t done so just yet. We’ll see!

Do you have any great DIY tutorials for cute play-time costumes?

I’d love to see them! And if you need another idea you can check out the self explanatory Charlie Brown costume I made for my son’s first Halloween. I can’t wait to start designing costumes for my daughter.