Now I'm back to working full-time I do miss those long lazy
days of maternity leave when Doof and I had all day, every day to ourselves and
could do whatever we liked, with seemingly endless time to fit everything in
(FYI this is much easier if you have a baby who wakes at 6am every
day... Hmmm).
So when I have days off now I like to spend them with Doof,
both just chilling out enjoying his company and also exploring new things
together.
Recently I came across some amazing bloggers who have so
many inventive ideas for creative/fun/sensory/messy play. After initially
finding one, I then found more and more and more - and with them a whole host
of lovely things for Doof and I to try together. There are way too many great
ones to name them all but some of my favourites are:
Here are some of the activities we've had fun playing with
in the last month:
(Some ideas came from me (but definitely not all as I seem
to lack imagination!! Lol), some from a mix of lots of places/amalgamating a
collection of thoughts etc and some from a specific blogger - who I always try
and link to/credit if I can remember where I first saw the idea)
**********
1. Couscous sandpit
There are hundreds of different things you can use in a
"sensory bin". At the moment I try to only use edible materials as
Doof is very capable to tucking into anything at any time! As a result I
thought couscous was a pretty perfect substitute for sand (apart from the
not-being-able-to-stick-together-to-make-sandcastles...). Doof doesn't have a
sandpit at home and our garden is too small to house any sand/water
pits/activity tables etc so I loved the idea of having a makeshift box we could
bring out whenever the weather is nice and he feels like a play.
What we used:
- large cake tupperware
- 1kg bag of couscous
- selection of beach toys (e.g. rake, spade, small bucket)
- selection of toys (e.g. Plastic animals, cars)
So when we had a nice sunny day I put out the couscous tray
and all the extra bits on the playmat outside. I showed Doofy what was there
and then let him explore. Firstly he was very excited by the rake and spade.
Then he tried to fill the bucket up using the spade (this was rather difficult
due to the large size of the spade and small size of the bucket!). Next he had
fun sprinkling the couscous between his fingers, making couscous rain and
burying the animals.
In all he played in his couscous pit for about 10 minutes -
which is quite a long time for his attention span!! Then when he had finished I
just swept up any spilt couscous back into the tub and then poured it all into
a ziplock bag so it's ready for use on another day - super easy :)
2. Rice crispie bin
I decided to try a bit of a variation of the sensory play
above and so made a hide-and-seek version.
What we used:
- large box of rice crispies
- empty cardboard box (just happened to be the only thing
that was roughly the right size)
- selection of animals/toys
First I got Doof to put all his animals into the box (a good
excuse to practice animal noises and encourage tidying!). I then opened the
cereal packet and helped D pour all the rice crispies into the box. I'm sure
older children could easily do that on their own but Doof's aim is not perfect
and I didn't fancy finding crispy bits all over the floor for the next week...
Doof really enjoyed fishing around for the animals, trying
to find any that were buried and sampling a fair few rice crispies along the
way! It may not have been the greatest idea to do this activity just before
lunch when D was already hungry!! Once he had found them all, we reburied them
and he found them all again J He happily played for 15 minutes until lunch was
ready and I think he would have played for even longer if I’d given him a few
more props like a spade or bucket. I thought I’d keep it quite simple though as
we only had limited time before lunch.
At the end we had fun tidying up too - Doof took all the
animals out and then used a big spoon (actually a vegetable drainer!) to shovel
the rice crispies into a ziplock bag. This bit was quite messy with lots of
spillage so I'd recommend doing it while still on the playmat/whatever surface
is easy for you to sweep clean! We did the whole activity sitting on a
sheet so when he was finished I could just pick the sheet up and tip the
crumbs/crushed up crispies straight into the bin :)
3. Making Easter cards
This idea came from Nuture Store - http://nurturestore.co.uk/easter-bunny-and-spring-lamb-cards and Doof loved making these cards almost as much as his
grandparents enjoyed receiving them :) I also loved the fact
that making them involved a while range of different activities – painting,
sticking, colouring etc – the variety kept Doof’s attention much longer than a
single activity usually would.
What we used:
- coloured card
- rabbit picture (via link)
- chick and sheep cookie cutters
- paints and felt tips
- black/white wool
First I printed off a sheet with the rabbit templates and
then let Doof loose with a selection of paints and brushes. He loved sitting at
his new little table and painted 3 lovely multi-coloured rabbits. I then cut
round the rabbits and Doof spread glue on the back of each and stuck one on the
front of each card. Inside each card we traced around a chick cookie cutter on
one side and a lamb cookie cutter on the other (D tried to help a bit with this
but it was really far too fiddly for him). He then coloured in the chicks with
felt tips – on one he even managed to accidentally draw a pretty realistic-looking
wing! I then cut some long lengths of wool which he then stuck to the lambs
(this bit was a bit messy as we had to use PVC glue to make it stick…). The finishing
touch was adding a pompom as the rabbit’s tail and writing a message inside :)
We spread this activity out over a whole afternoon which was
perfect for Doof as it meant he could spend as much time as he liked on each separate
portion and we had little “play breaks” in between so he didn’t feel at any
point that he was *having* to do a particular thing. Of course if your toddler
if more focused or a bit older they could make these cards in a much shorter
time period!!
**********
If any of these have given you ideas for future play then we’d love to hear about what you get up to and if you have any other ideas for us to try then please leave a comment as I’m always happy to have new inspiration
Next month I’ll post about what new activities we’ve tried :)
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