Wordless Wednesday – September 26, 2012

Adventures in crockpot cooking.... I'll let you know how it turns out, ha ha!

Heeeeey......Macaroni!

I've seen a lot of 'sensory bag' and 'sensory bin' pins for babies and toddlers on Pinterest lately, and I've pinned a few myself.  I have every intention of making these - lots of them.  Unfortunately, many of my crafting supplies are still in boxes in our basement (which, if you've never been to Sydney, NS, you may not know that the stairs going down to many older basements are pretty much ladder-like in their steepness).  As long as I'm alone with the baby during the day, I won't be going down there anytime soon.   I've also read a lot of reviews from pinners on these sensory bags, about how the bags will frequently rip or leak, and make big messes.  I'm not a fan of big messes.

I decided that I was going to make Jaelyn's first sensory bag, and that it was going to be simple.  What to put in it?  Macaroni.  That's it.  No liquid, no color, just macaroni.  I found a large freezer bag, put in some, made sure I didn't trap a lot of air in it, and sealed it.  I also went over the opening with packing tape, as I didn't want the pasta to 'escape' and go everywhere...and raw macaroni is not the best play toy for an infant when it is not encapsulated in a freezer bag.

It took about a week for my little sweet Jaelyn to get up the courage to actually touch the macaroni sensory bag...she's shy around things she isn't familiar with sometimes.  She finally is grabbing it, shaking it, squishing it, and throwing it.  She's not sure about it...it feels weird...and that's the point.

Baby Safe Wipes Box

Who hasn't heard about that dreaded moment when a mother finds that her child has taken every single wipe out of the box and thrown them around the room?  Not only has it made a mess, but depending on how long the wipes have been out and the manner in which they were thrown, they may be unusable.  I recently found a Pinterest idea that was pinned by "A Spotted Pony" (http://aspottedpony.com/fun-for-kids/turn-a-wipe-container-into-the-best-infant-and-toddler-toy/876/)  You take an empty wipes box, and fill it with squares of fabric.  Problem solved.

I decided that this was a pin I would like to attempt, but I realized I don't own a sewing machine and since I didn't sew, I didn't own pieces of fabric.  I did, however, have a bag of baby clothes that I was going to donate to Value Village (mostly items that I couldn't sell, or give to people that I knew personally that needed them, and I wasn't keeping for the next child).  I grabbed some scissors and cut them up into sqaure-ish shapes (hey, I'm not a perfectionist).  I also received free Disney stickers in the mail, so I put them on the box...and voila!  A new sensory toy, and it cost me $0 to accomplish!

Jaelyn is mostly intrigued with the pop-up lid right now, but each time she plays with it, she understands more and more that there are things inside that she can pull out.  ThIs is a great learning toy that any Mom or Dad can make!