Homemade toys, games, and activities

Stifler's - posted on 06/28/2011

Mine is the same. He;s amused by laundry pegs that I shoved in an old yoghurt container and he puts them in empty bottles and gets them out again for ages, empty milk bottles and egg cartons that are going in the recycling bin but haven't made it there yet and home made play dough.

Elfrieda - posted on 06/27/2011

My son is 1.5 years, and he likes boxes and toilet paper tubes and tissue paper. I think a pull-behind toy is great for when your son starts walking, and a pushtoy to help him learn to walk in the first place, and maybe some stacking toys. Other than that, stuff around the house is where the real excitement is! :)
When my son was younger, his favourite toy was two canning rings tied together with a 2 foot long string. Yes, choking alert, etc, but he never got into trouble with it.

Chatty - posted on 06/26/2011

Oh, good -- I'm not creative so I'm always looking for cool ideas.

Roxanne seems to enjoy the packaging more than the toy. Today we went to Walmart and bought a big umbrella for the patio, and when I offered to bring out her bubble gun to play with she was so engrossed in the bubble wrap from the packaging that she didn't even look up. ;)

Lissa - posted on 06/26/2011

OK some of the things I have done,ones I can remember at least.

Keep your old cereal boxes etc and make our own shop.

Make a giant snakes and ladders so you can be the counter (buy cheap wallpaper tape some strips together). It's a craft as well as a game.

Make your own version of Guess Who with pics of your friends and family. Obviously done on your computer print out little versions of the photos with the names underneath on one sheet then make card sized versions. Then you can pick from the card size version and put counters on the A4/A3 version.

All those odd socks, sock puppets, build your own box theater and have a show.

The dice game- make a giant dice out of a papered box which you can then paint. Someone rolls and the person next to them has to make up what they have to do that many times. As in 5 spins, find 3 red things, do 6 star jumps.

Treasure hunts but some crayons or bubbles, make your clues set them out and get hunting. Alternatively a list of things to find with bubbles etc as a prize.

A cardboard box, well you can make anything.

Cut a hole in a box, put some rubber bands on you have a guitar. Rice in a tube, tape it up a maraca. Pot's and a wooden spoon, you can't go wrong.



Pretend to be different animals see who can guess right.

Make your own obstacle course, crawl through the boxes, jump over the cans, weave in and out of the bamboo canes.

Tents from sheets, never fails endless fun.

Hide some things under a blanket, guess what's there by touch, get your children to do it for you.

As for crafty things, chalk is cheap, cheerful you can draw all over your paths then wash it away. Cheap wallpaper can be a lot cheaper than paper and you can make giant pictures.

Jenni - posted on 06/26/2011

That is so COOL Liz!! I love the light boxes, they're so neat!
I also like the idea to let them face paint in a mirror.
Yes, I agree... my kids play with store bought toys for maybe a week at most and then barely touch them again. Especially when they're around 1 years old. I think once they figure it out the fun is gone.

Here's an easy to make one- a rice box. Like a sandbox but with rice for a different texture. Use funnels and different shapped and sized containers. You can also use regular sand box toys. If you really want to get fancy, you could dye some of the rice with food colouring.
You could also use different shaped pastas.

I've made catapillars out of egg cartons with pipe cleaners and googly eyes. You could also make butterflies.
You can also use egg cartons to go outside and collect natural items like; feathers, rocks, flowers, nuts, seeds etc.

Get a photo album (the kind where the plastic sticks to the pages) and press and dry flowers and leaves.

We make pictures with pasta and cereal. Not really a toy, more of a craft.

Making indoor tents are always a blast with my kids.

BOXES- you can never run out of ideas to do with a good ol' cardboard box. I've made them into cars, playhouses, trains.

Alright, that's all I got for now. I'm going to have to try the lightbox idea though. Love it!