Man, oh man. Toddler time, all the time, indoors in a small space is not for the faint of heart. Asher normally only spends one or two afternoons a week at his baby school, but if we’re not taking him to school it’s because we are having a play date, going on a family adventure, or attending an event- this kid is BUSY and accustomed to being out and about. So with our family being sheltered in place for over a month now, I’ve been on my hustle to come up with activities that are stimulating and engaging for Asher with what we’ve got on hand.
I have a small craft stash of my own, combined with this craft kit that I’d gotten for Asher for like $5 at Aldi a while back. I’ve linked some similar sets, but the only things I used out of it were paint, poms poms and a few colored foam shapes- you’ll see those are all easily substituted with what you might have on hand.
trash tube drop
I turned trash into treasure for this activity, reusing toilet paper and paper towel tubes. I taped them to our window guard, but you could use any wall or cabinet or even the fridge. I put a colored foamy on each tube, and gave Asher a cup full of pom poms to drop through. He didn’t quite get the concept of matching the colors, but has been enthusiastically tossing the poms through the tube all week, along with whatever tiny toys he can find, so major win for very minor effort. I’d have used paint or marker or stickers to differentiate the tubes if I didn’t have foamies, and was planning to use cotton balls until I realized that we had poms.
pasta play
We don’t waste food, so I put some leftover spaghetti to good use. I ran it under hot water to soften and dampen, then divided it into baggies and added some food coloring. I massaged to mix, let sit for about ten minutes and then rinsed in a colander to get off any excess dye before I tossed them on a tray for Asher to go to town. He freaking LOVED it- surprisingly didn’t try to eat the pasta (I think he didn’t recognize it as food because of the crazy colors) but played and played for nearly an hour. I worried his hands were dyed, but it was just some colored starch buildup, and cleanup was easy and fast with warm soapy water. I threw the noodles into a stasher in the fridge and got several uses (rinsing at the beginning and end of playtime) before they started to fall apart and needed tossing.
homemade play dough
I used this recipe, and it worked well! I skipped both food coloring and essential oils and used spices for color and scent instead. I’m not opposed to food coloring on principle (obviously, if you read the last paragraph) but I wasn’t sure how much Ashe would attempt to eat, and figured the spices would at least make it smell nice. I left some plain white, and used turmeric for yellow, paprika for orange, spirulina for green, and pumpkin pie spice for brown. It wasn’t the most vibrant color spectrum, but definitely enough of a variety- I was surprised that he didn’t really try eating it, though. He’s officially a play dough fan though- it’s coming out to play several times a week these days.
trash painting
I literally rescued the supplies for this project from the recycling bin. I unfolded a (sanitized) delivery box and cut open a clear plastic bag. I used packing tape to sandwich some paint between the plastic and the cardboard, and sealed it up with minimal air in it. The idea is that it’s fingerpainting without the mess, but I guess the mess is what Asher really likes, because he was pretty disinterested in this project after just a few minutes. He’s a wild one, so y’all will likely have better luck keeping on task with this one than we did- he strongly prefers fingerpainting with his yogurt.
flax fun
This one’s so easy! Simply soak a cup of flax seeds in two cups of water. The water will form a gel around the seeds and it’s a majorly messy but super fun texture for baby fingers. We did this activity in a bin, on a tarp, in a diaper, and headed straight for the bath when we were done. It worked well, and cleanup was simply rinsing the bin, bowls, and baby.
I also had some water beads from plant propagation, so we plumped those up in a bowl and took them and his little bin outside. They bounced everywhere and they even got stuck in his ringlets- adorableee.
We’re going to be exclusively at home for at least another month, so I’d love any other ideas or suggestions of fun stuff to keep this dude entertained- hit me with them in the comments!
Of course, I’d love to expand our stash of sensory stuff. I’m eyeing this little IKEA table, which has slots for sensory bins that double as storage. He loves the big ball pit at his baby school- and I’m trying to figure where I can fit this little one into our place. I’m hoping to find a water table like this one or this one on sale as it starts to warm up, and I think this little sprinkler situation is going to be tons of fun for him.
And as always, tag me if you try these- I love seeing what y’all are up to!
XXRavayna
