My 5 year old loves Dinosaurs. So it was only appropriate to have an Excavation Dino Dig party. I believe to set the mood for an awesome party is to give an awesome invitation to all of the guests. We took plastic dinosaurs and covered them in this sand, coffee grounds, salt and water mixture to make dino eggs. It took about 3 days for the eggs to dry. When they dried we wrapped them in a piece of cellophane and tied it at the top. The actual information was printed in a Newspaper style that read  "The Mosiac Times"  top story: Dinosaurs were found stmping the grounds at (park or place of party) Scientists will be there to join the head Excavation Scientist (birthday child) on (date) at (time).  I added a few real dino facts in the article.  At the bottom of the paper we let the guests know that they needed to excavate the egg! We attached the 'information' invitation rolled up (newspaper style) with string to the egg package. What a hit!  We invited 22 families, every single one came!! With a big crowd I wanted to make sure we had plenty for the kids to do. We had many, many plastic little dinosaurs to use for differnet games and give outs to the kids. As a "warmup" activity, kids beaded dinosaur necklaces (Oriental Trading Co.).  When all of the guests arrived, we played our games. The little "scientists" had to go on a tour to find the plastic dino figures that were all over the grass. Then we had the Dinosaurs stomp to the nests and hatch baby dinos. (dino figures in white balloons, kids sat on them until they popped). My husband buried a dino pinata in the sand and the kids took their shovels (they got a pail and shovel when they arrived at the party) and had to excavate the Dino that was in the invitation. Big Hit!!  Once the dino was found, we played the pinata game. The kids were starting to get hungry so we ate.  I had dino bones (mac and cheese), dino teeth (carrots), dino chicken nuggets, dino eyes (grapes), and dino fossils (pretzel sticks).  I made a Volcano cake (bundt cake on top of a square cake) with lava(orange icing).  Dino candles topped the cake. For the kids, I made cupcakes with 1 dino gummy in the inside and let the kids decorate it themselves. They had different colors of piped icing and dino sprinkles(found in the grocerers baking area).  They had so much fun decorating and even more fun finding the dino in the middle!! The parents enjoyed the rich chocolate lava cake. We then gathered in a circle, sang a few dino songs (change the words to common nursery rymes).  The goody bags were very simple, everything from Oriental Trading Co.,in a brown paper bag- bouncy rock ball, flashlights, dino transformer, stickers, some candy, dino finger puppets and glow in the dark dinosaur shapes. After about 2 hours of excitment, I wanted to be extinct!! But what mattered most is that my son thought it was the best party he has ever been to!! haha!! And I am hearing from friends of the guests, that they heard it was creative and great.....It was!