Backyard Dice

Backyard Dice How to Make and Play with Large Wooden Dice for Backyard Play

Homemade backyard dice made from leftover 4×4 wood beams are perfect weekend project. They make great gifts for friends and family. You can bring and play with them in the backyard of your or a friends house, at the beach or park.

I made these six dice from leftover lumber, paint, and Sharpies, which made the cost of my project absolutely nothing. Read further to find out how I made them and the games we play with them.

Make your dice

Both adults and kids would be playing with these dice I made sure my wood wasn’t too large to handle. I had a sizeable 4×4 lumber in our stockpile, which had more than enough room to cut six dice.

Four by four lumber measures at 3-5/8 inches by 3-5/8 inches. Isn’t that annoying? So to have a perfect or near-perfect cube, I measured each piece 3-5/8 inches long using a speed square and pen. Don’t be afraid to skip sections of the beam that aren’t in good condition. I had to cut off some pieces because there were large chunks of wood missing. Luckily my lumber was large enough to be forgiving. Using a miter saw, cut each cube out on the lines.

Prep your dice

Once all the cubes cut, they need sanding with sandpaper. You don’t want kiddos to come running to you with fifty little splinters in their hands. Sand hard on the edges and corners. I liked to sand all of them into a slight round curve edge, almost like plastic dice.

Once they look and feel smooth, paint or spraypaint Kilz on all sides of the cubes. The first coat will seal the wood from moisture, sun exposure, and helps to reduce wood splintering. I painted with a brush and took it a bit of time. I could only paint a couple of sides at a time before letting them dry to turn over and paint the other sides. Painting may take time but once done, it looked fantastic.

Make cubes look like dice

Lastly, the dots need to be painted on. Wanting the circles to be perfect, I tested a quarter, nickel, and a penny for size preference. The nickel-size worked best for my cubes. Next, I drew a circle with a ballpoint pen around the coin.

Using a small paintbrush, paint each circle a designated color on each side of the block. I wanted the backyard dice to be fun looking for the kids. I also wanted different colors for some of the different games described below. The colors need to be dark and bright. Pastel colors do not work well on these blocks.

If you don’t have different color paints then you can use multi-colored Sharpies to color them in. These can work better than painting. The markers give more control in coloring, dries faster, and possibly more color variety.

Games to Play

These dice are made, painted, and dried. Now they are ready to be played with family and friends. Here is my running list of dice games that will keep the kids, friends, family, and everyone playing for hours.

• Yahzee
• 5000 (or what my Grandmother called Bumpkiss)
• Bunco
• Mathematical Dice War. The game needs two to three players were each player gets two dice. Pick your math, addition, subtraction, or multiplication. Each player rolls their dice and does the math. You can play it where the highest answer wins or whoever yells out their answer first.
• Crazy Sequence. Each color dice represented as a different physical activity, which is stated before the game. For example, spinning in circles, cartwheels, bunny hops, etc. The player rolls the dice and needs to perform that activity toward the direction of the goal line. For example, the purple die is bunny hops, and a three comes up. The player must make the bunny hop three times. You can roll one or multiple dice at one time to make it more fun.