Natural Treasure Basket for Baby

Time for baby girl to start exploring a bit more. I can't believe it's around two years to the day since I posted a picture of a similar treasure basket. 

Treasure baskets are a wonderful way for babies to explore everyday objects that you have around your home. Sometimes they have a theme - the theme of this basket is natural materials. 
'The Little Book Of Treasure Baskets' has lots more ideas and tips for putting together baskets of your own.  

Remember - safety first!  Never leave your baby alone while playing with a treasure basket and only give them objects you feel are safe for them to explore.

Baby Sensory Bottles

Baby girl is nearly 5 months old already and so keen to touch and explore anything she can get her hands on. 


Clear plastic bottles can be filled with a whole range of objects that baby can safely explore, just make sure the lid on on super tight!! 







This particular bottle has been filled with water, daisies and colourful sequins from one of the pound shops. 


Fascinating!

Valentine's Water Play

Super simple water play fun....

Hearts, petals, confetti and some spoons and containers for pouring and filling.

The only thing we forgot was glitter! 

Valentine's Sensory Bins and Coloured Rice

I've been meaning to try making coloured rice for soooooo long but all the instructions I found involved using alcohol and what seemed like rather complicated and laborious lists of things to do.


And then I found a super simple one.

Basically, you just put the rice in a box with a lid, sprinkle on some food colouring and give it a good shake and then lay it out on a baking tray to dry.  It really was that easy!

Since we're close to Valentine's Day I made up a red and pink sensory bin with all things hearty and lovely.

It's definitely something I'll do again in different colours as all that pouring and filling was great fun.




....and here's another basket idea for babies, full of red things to look at and investigate.

Colourful Ice Play

We've frozen things in ice before, I think Halloween was the last time, so something a little different and super colourful this time.

We put buttons, reels and Duplo blocks into a couple of tubs and then froze them overnight.

When we took them out the freezer we loved the colours shining through the ice ......... 















 ..........and we had great fun chipping away at it with a fork and spoon and of course our fingers to release the objects as the ice melted. 

The fun thing about this activity is that we could keep going back to it over a couple of hours as the ice block melted .........




and if we do it again, we'll just choose different things to put in a different container and have a whole new experience! 

Polar Bears in the Snow

Happy New Year!

It's been a crazy-busy couple of months with the arrival of our little girl and so time has been quite limited for crafty things, but we have still been busy with lots of simple play ideas.

We've used the polar bears before with blocks of ice but this time we set up a little small world scene using a baking tray covered in foil, some pebbles and shaving foam.  We also (later)added silver confetti snowflakes for added fun.

The polar bears look quite at home and this little activity was enjoyed well too as it was played with for a couple of days in a row.

Creepy Sensory Ice

This week we had fun watching the ice melt as we tried to get the spooky confetti and bugs out of the ice, super easy and lots of fun!

Fill an ice tray with spooky bits and water -
food colouring and glitter is optional

When frozen, tip out the ice into a tray.

Spooky, icy, sensory fun!

Spooky Water

Ok, so I know it's a bit early for Halloween but my little one has recently developed a real fascination with water and is constantly pulling over a step or little chair to play at the sink.

This isn't always ideal so instead of playing at the sink (and flooding the kitchen) I put some water in a shallow tray and tipped in some spooky creatures and confetti that I usually save for Halloween time.

You can see different sized spiders, mice and other creepy crawlies and I also put in a couple of plastic shot glasses for pouring and filling.

This experience is great for imaginative play as well as developing pouring skills and let's face it, playing in water is just great fun!

Rosemary and Lavender Scented Playdough

I cut back the rosemary bush in my garden yesterday and have an absolute stack of it!  I'm planning to dry it and then store it or maybe even freeze some but there's just soooooo much of it.

So this morning - a grey day - we decided to make playdough au natural and add some fragrant rosemary to it.  












We ended up with rosemary trees and some pebbles around the playdough and then also added some lavender from the garden.  It smells delicious! 



Then we added some animals and little one had a great time moving the animals about, pummeling, rolling and squishing the playdough and rearranging the trees and pebbles.

He was absorbed in this for a whole hour!  
What a hit!

If you want to make playdough you can do so in a couple of minutes.....

1 cup flour
1/2 a cup salt
1 teaspoon cream of tartar
1 tablespoon oil
1 cup boiling water

Mix it all up and add whatever you like - colour, glitter, scent etc

Summer Flower Fun

The weather here has been gorgeous over the last few weeks and that combined with our summer break means that the sewing and making side of things has pretty much come to a standstill over the last few weeks.
But we've still been busy playing and having fun.


Today we found some petals lying on the grass that had fallen off some beautiful pinky-red roses so we decided to pick them up and then collect some more flowers from around the garden and float them in some water.  



The colours are fabulous don't you think?  They just say summer!

Anyway, little one poked, prodded, dunked and sailed the flowers along like little boats before watering them and then decided that they needed some company and added a couple of ducks and a shark.  

Well why not?  

They need water too, right?!

Easter Discovery Fun

Here are some ideas to keep you busy over Easter....

Firstly here's a little tub of mess that's a whole lot of fun!

I had a look around the house to see what I could find - Easter decorations, eggs, chicks, feathers and tipped it into the tub.  

The great thing about the plastic eggs (that are meant for egg hunts) is that you can hide things inside them which makes them great fun for cracking open.  I added lentils to cover the base of the tray so when you add some lentils into the eggs, they become great little shakers!

There are lots of textures in this tub so it kept little one amused for quite a while and it's something he's gone back to quite a few times now.




We've also been doing some printing in spring colours - super simple circles!  I used a little tub for him to print with as it was easy for him to hold but you could also use one half of the plastic Easter egg.









And finally we've been talking about yellow and collecting yellow things in our basket.  
Easy!!

Happy Easter everyone!

Ice Play

There are so many ideas around just now for winter sensory play and many of them look really fabulous, so this one may not look all that flash but it was a whole lot of fun and kept little one entertained for quite a looooooong time by his standards!

...and it's just ice, a tray (or in this case a lid from a box) and a couple of cute polar bears.







He's still a bit young for small world play but he's definitely at the early stages- offering food and drinks to little animals and people.

Best of all he just enjoyed touching the wet, slippery ice and splashing about in the water as the ice melted.

Next time we might try shaving foam or cotton wool and sparkly bits.  

Baby Play Mat

This is what I made last year for little one when he was only 7 months old at Christmas and he just sat on top of it like a little Christmas pudding!

The mat evolved as I worked on it as I didn't really have a set plan of exactly what I wanted to make.  I knew I wanted a range of touchy-feely fabrics and bits of ribbon and to try to make different themes/scenes, so the outcome turned out to be flower shape with each scene looking a bit like a petal.

I used bits of fabric that I had lying around, the only thing I bought was a larger piece to back it and some squeakers for inside the sun and the bus.  I'm not sure why a sun might squeak but it's been lots of fun anyway!

weather scene

The weather scene has a felt rainbow, towelling cloud with shiny lame raindrops and ribbon rays coming from the sun.

bus scene

The double decker bus is made from mix of cotton and felt and has a squeaker behind the driver.  
The leaves have different patterns and textures and some have crinkly paper inside to make a nice scrunchy sound.

dinosaur scene

The dinosaur is made from fleece and has different ribbons stitched around its back, the 'smoke' from the volcano is a piece of netting and the sandy looking ground is a piece of rough linen.

moon scene

The space scene has a moon with craters which are stitched on top of wadding to give a padded look.  The stars are the shiny lame again and the rocket is made from felt.  It can fly around the moon but it's attached with a ribbon and can be secured on the moon with a piece of Velcro.

garden scene

The garden scene has a butterfly with wings that can be lifted up and a flower with crinkly leaves.  The grass is fringed for added texture.

I tried to use lots of colours, prints, textures and sounds to make the mat interesting for a baby, but didn't buy anything specifically for the mat, I just tried to use what I had (apart from the squeakers). 

He has enjoyed using it and hopefully will continue to do so as he grows and develops, learning to use it in different ways.

I thought carefully about safety while making this as I know my little one put absolutely everything in his mouth at that stage.  It really goes without saying that if you want to make one, choose materials which you think are safe and suitable for your baby. Remember to ensure everything is securely attached to the mat and never leave your baby unsupervised when on the mat.  

Messy Play - Shaving Foam

As an early years teacher I've used shaving foam loads of times, but this is the first time I've tried it with little one.  

He's 18 months now and still tasting anything I give him so I was keen to see how he might react with this!  

Needless to say he had a quick taste and then didn't bother again.

Shaving foam is so cheap - less than 30p a can if you buy the cheap supermarket stuff.

 I sprayed a bit of it in a tray and sat him in the high chair at the dining table, it can be messy but it's really easy to clean up.

At first he wasn't too sure but after a few little prods he had his hands in the foam and completely covered.

I gave him a couple of spoons and little cups to play with and we discovered that if you turn the cup upside down into the foam and try to pull it back up, it creates a vacuum, so it's hard to do but when you do manage to pull it up it makes a great noise!


Next time we'll maybe try some little polar bears and go for an arctic theme - a lovely experience for older toddlers too.


My children at school also love to write and draw in the foam and if you add a little glitter it gives it some Christmas sparkle!

Shiny Sensory Tub

Today we collected shiny things for the tub from all over the house (kinda building up to Christmas!). 

I'm sure we could have completely filled it as anyone who knows me will know I'm a bit of a magpie when it comes to sparkle!



The mirrors are still a firm favourite for this 18 month old and the reflection in the back of the little spoon held his interest for quite a while too.  

Can you spot the sparkly key?  It's a Christmas decoration that I picked up at a garden centre recently...it'll be brilliant for storytelling when he's a bit bigger!