My two, like many, many other children in the land, are big dino fans. It really doesn’t look it from this picture, but I promise they were excited – it’s just so hard to get a photo of them together! They were also excited when a package arrived and inside were toys from the new ‘Dino World’ range from HTI Toys!
The range includes realistic dinosaur figures, including Triceratops, Stegasaurus, Brontosaurus and T-Rex – all the favourites! There are also hatching eggs, dinos in slime in an egg, and growing eggs so you can grow your own dino as if by magic.
Tink couldn’t wait to get her hands on the dino figures (which annoyed her, as I had to take some photos first, ha!), and H had his eye on the dino eggs and the ‘Dig and Discover’ set.
The ‘Dig and Discover’ sets also feature the ‘Big Four’ dinos and are a great way for kids to have a go at excavating their own dino skeleton which can then be made into a 3-D model.
H has had a few of this kind of kit before, but there’s usually only a tooth or fossil. He was keen to try out this, larger kit and build the model once he’d found all the bones. The kit comes with a mini mallet, chisel and a brush so you can excavate your bones from the ‘rock’.
Now, I’m all for an honest review, because otherwise, what’s the point? So, this ‘rock’ (plaster of Paris?) is hard. The tools are small and plastic. H isn’t known for his patience… Can you see where this is going?
It took H quite a while to actually get into the ‘rock’ to reveal even a hint of a bone. He tried the chisel, he tried the mallet and chisel… he broke the chisel…
Aaand… he got frustrated and gave up. For a while. He calmed down and eventually came back to it, but it still took a long time to get the bones out. There are pros and cons to this; yes, it makes a toy that costs £4.99 (RRP) last a while, but children aren’t known for being patient, even those that are better at it than H, and they could quickly become bored of not getting anywhere. So, be warned! Also be warned that this makes a lot of powdery, white mess, so do it outside, or on some newspaper inside. Still, at least they’ll eventually have their own, cool dinosaur skeleton!
H also really enjoyed playing with the realistic dino figures from the range. He likes to arrange them in realistic settings, so he made a little scene using our mini pond (because all the dinos had plastic bowls back then!) and some of his other figures.
The Dino World figures are really very nicely done and as well as looking like realistic scale models, feel durable too, so won’t get ruined despite being played with often. Tink has enjoyed these too.
We’ve also played with the Dinos in slime, which were messy, but it’s slime, so the kids were enthralled. Until H couldn’t get it off his hands, then he wasn’t so keen! We haven’t yet tried to hatch our own dino, but that’s definitely something we’ll save for a rainy day.
H in particular is very into dinosaurs at the moment, thanks to him seeing the most recent Jurassic World film recently, so these have been great for keeping him occupied!
The Dino World range of toys are available from HTI stockists such as The Works* and The Range* priced from £1.99 to £9.99 (RRP) (* denotes an affiliate link – more info about that here.)
Disclosure: We were gifted some items from the Dino World range in return for an honest review. All opinions are our own.
Kelly is a mother of two – her son H and daughter Tink. H is home educated, Tink is autistic. Kelly is a self-employed Virtual Assistant… Life is busy!
