Week 3 Round Up – 31 Day Sensory Play Challenge

Our 31 Day Sensory Play Challenge continues to go from strength to strength. After the success of week 1 and week 2 I wondered if there would be a dip in week 3 as enthusiasm may wane. However, quite the opposite has happened. The best part of the challenge for us, other than getting to do lots of sensory activities, is seeing the photographs of readers deeply involved in sensory play. There are lots of photographs to share this week.

First lets recap the sensory adventures Adam has had this week:

Seven bloggers have been involved in our 31 Day Sensory Play Challenge Blog Hop this week. Check out their fantastic posts:

Mihaela from Best Toys 4 Toddlers is also joining us on the sensory play challenge. Check out her brilliant sensory posts:

All Good Things Come In Threes have also joined us on the challenge. Have a look at their activities here.

 

Photographs from Adventures of Adam readers: 

 

Day 12 – Bubbles

“We painted with bubbles today. The first four photos are of the bubbles blown up onto paper. We talked about colour mixing. The final three photos are of painting with brushes in the aerated paint and we talked about the effect it made on the paper, why it was different to the other bubbles we painted with.” Haley

 

“I initially made one of the foam ideas from a blog but once William realised he couldn’t eat it he lost interest so instead we blew bubbles the traditional way. He loved this and for the first time was chasing the bubbles and running through them. It just shows how the sensory play has built his confidence.” Sarah

 

“Bubble painting/painting with bubbly paint and blowing bubbles.” Lucy

 

Day 13 – Texture

“Today’s sensory of the day..textured stepping stones and hung ribbons in the tunnel. Just started doing this. So much fun!” Kelly

 

“I have a poorly little miss after her immunisations so today’s plan for tin foil painting went out the window. Will do this at a later date. I searched around my house for different textures she could explore – Ribbon, laces, cardboard, pinecone, bath puff thing, bubble wrap, velcro, cotton wool, feather, artifical grass sample, flannel and balloon weight. Put it in a wooden tray and let her play.” Kerrie

 

“We made a texture trail. Coloured rice, lentils, glittery paper, a fabric table mat, tissue paper, cotton wool, microfiber cloth, felt, dry spaghetti then a leather table mat. Miles enjoyed telling Ivan and me all of the different textures he could feel “scrunchy…crumbly…soft…bumpy…” Anneka

 

“We’ve added to our texture trail! I made some ”hidey playdough” (plain dough with colour/bits hidden in the middle, as it’s squished/played with the colour and bits come through). Miles enjoyed finding out what was inside…then.we rolled them out onto the tuff spot. He loved squishing through them.” Anneka

 

“We split this into two themes. One to experiment with different types of food the other using the fake grass samples. I filled a muffin tray with different sorts of food for William to touch. Quite how a 16 month old who has only had chocolate once knew to go straight to the chocolate drops I will never know. He did eventually play with everything and got into a lovely mess. Next we used the fake grass. He didn’t like walking on it at all but was quite happy driving his tractor over every different piece of grass.” Sarah

“We finally managed to get outside today. We collected different textures from the park and took them home to explore with the others we had in the house. We talked about what they felt like and the eldest used her face too as it felt different to using her hands. They then used paint and printed from them onto paper. They stuck pine needles too, which were ‘sharp’.” Haley

 

We love this texture Dominoe game created by Tanya

 

“We had a texture hunt around the house as my 4 year old loves treasure maps and hunts. He helped write the list and we all suggested textures and wrote them down. He then found things around the house for that texture. To challenge him he couldn’t use the same object twice. We then extended it into materials so he had to find something wooden, plastic etc and then tell me about the texture. He particularly loved finding something furry and went and hunted down a rather indignant cat!” Jennie

 

Day 14 – Ice

“I decided that we would have a go at ice painting and filled up an ice cube tray with paint, glitter paint and confetti glue first thing this morning and put in the freezer. Went out to Creation Station and discovered that we were doing ice painting there! They gave us a watered down block of paint first and that just made the paper wet. The small block of solid paint worked better and worked better on watercolour paper.” Julie

 

“For this I used food colouring to make ice ‘pens’. William quickly tried grabbing hold so he could use them to draw on the paper but they were too big and slippy for him to get a proper grip. Will definitely make them smaller next time. As an alternative we got out our easy watercolour pens and wax crayons and practiced making marks, letters and numbers which is William’s favourite activity at the moment.” Sarah

 

“Coloured ice cube play.” Lucy

 

“Water, ice and cool whip. frozen for snow because my daughter eats everything.” Kelly

 

“I set up a small world scene for this as we have taken stock of some new animals recently and this was a good chance to play with them. I trapped a few whales at the bottom too. Little one took a few icy cotton wool balls off, wiped the ice block of the shaving foam and picked off the animals. Once she had done that, I gave her some warm water so she could excavate the whales. We eventually had a lot of icy blue water to play with and she was happy to continue playing so we found her larger whales and she had fun with the water. We then watched Blue Planet together and I think the music during lights and sounds before bed will likely be whale music.” Haley

 

“Last night I put water in a bang tray and froze it. We made some skiers, then I put some frozen water filled plastic ice cubes on the tray and some wooden trees and let Miles play. Ivan played with the water filled ice cubes…and tried to eat them (of course)!” Anneka

 

“Got ready ice with different food types inside them, 3 sizes ice cubes, 3 sizes spoons. Squares and circles. My little girl had a go but I can’t say she was very into it. She does not like getting dirty/messy. Kept saying dirty and showing her hands. She also said that they are cold. But what it counts she had a go. I put in the small ice cubes red pepper and parsley herbs, in the middle square ones there is peas and pasta. The round bigger ones there is pepper chips, green herb still from the pot, oil and salad dressing and flour. I just improvised with whatever I found in order to make them different colour. I also learnt myself that oil dont freeze and was on top.” Yil

 

“I did ice blocks for my little one without anything in yesterday and she loved it, spent the entire time scooping them out and transferring them to a saucepan.” Lee-anne

 

“We are loving our Frozen icy polar fun! The bucket is just a regular sand bucket. I put it in the freezer. I didn’t fill it to the top as the water does expand while freezing. Some of the water I added some food coloring. The bowl shaped one for some reason didn’t freeze completely and the children, much to their delight, poked a hole and began swimming the figures in it! Perhaps if you took it out right before it was completely frozen? The large ones just sat on my porch all night.” Cindy

 

“After tea I said to Alfie “let’s go play” and took him to the kitchen. He went straight for his plastic sheet making me smile from ear to ear, I made Alfie some green ice (need to get more food colouring!) and he wasn’t quite sure about it lol I didn’t think he would like it but we gave it a go anyways. Daddy was trying to encourage him to give the ice a feel but he didn’t want to. He kept pointed at it and at us so that we could touch it. I put some of his bath toys in the bowl and that got him to stick his hand in, but only to grab his toys. Then we got a spoon and he liked swirling the ice around with that and if some ice fell out he would pick it up and put it back. He really enjoyed it when I swirled the ice around with the spoon because I was making a right ruckus and that’s what Alfie loves!” Lorena 

 

“I froze some ice hands and also an ice block with some frozen berries in it. I let her play with the ice hands before and she helped put them in the freezer. She kept saying oooo when touching the ice and I explained it is cold. She also gave herself brain freeze from eating the frozen block.” Kerrie

 

“We made a ‘snow’ mound surrounded by textured ice – frozen lentils, rice, pasta, foil, pompoms, pipe cleaners, glitter and small toys. Joshua was very interested to begin with and tried touching and stepping on the ice. However, he quickly lost interest once his hand and feet got cold! He then enjoyed handing me the different ice cubes and watching while I touched them and made them melt.” Monica

 

Day 15 – Scented play dough

“I made some dough with talc and body butter. My house stinks! But it works – it took a whole 300g bottle to make it to a consistency you could work with and probably needed a bit more as it was quite soft. After we’d spent 20 mins digging matchsticks & googly eyes in it, we went back to Play-doh and Mr Potato Head body parts.” Julie

 

“We made blue, glittery, vanilla scented play dough (blue as it’s going to be reused as a lake tomorrow for messy play). First time joshua touched play dough. At first he wasn’t so sure but once I have him some ‘tools’ he loved marking it with the cookie cutters and pulling out objects I’d stuck into it! It’s still out and joshua keeps coming back to play with it. Definitely repeating…” Monica

 

“Only a couple of photos today as I was showing William how to make scented play dough cupcakes!” Sarah

 

“We played with calming playdough this morning before little one’s nap and Eldest’s quiet time. Ylang Ylang, Patchouli, Lavender and Eucalyptus (for the colds!) and an assortment of bedtime related playdough tools. Eldest commented that the playdough smelt like her mummy’s candles!” Haley

 

“We made ginger spiced play dough for the sensory challenge today. It smelled lovely. I popped the dough on the tuff spot an with some shaped cutters, rolling pin and bowls with sultanas, cloves and star anise in them. Miles enjoyed decorating his ginger shapes. He loved the smell of the star anise but did not like the cloves! I let Ivan feel the play dough and the bits in the bowls. He seemed to quite like the spiky cloves.” Anneka

 

“The pink is vanilla and the blue is cinnamon. He chose from my spice section after sniffing lots. He also picked his own tools.” Jennie

 

Peppermint scented Playdough for today’s#31DaySensoryPlayChallenge. This made the house and my hands smell amazing and one little one described it as smelling like “a lovely minty forest.” Clares Little Tots

 

Day 16 – Light play

“This morning we’ve played with glow sticks and torches for the sensory challenge. Ivan and Miles enjoyed waving the sticks around & wearing them. I also hid Miles’ Thomas the Tank Engine and he used his torch to find him. I also hid the glow sticks in Miles’ bed and he found them.” Anneka

 

“We set up the dark tent. I found all our flashing and light up toys and turned off the lights. Joseph was most interested in whizzing the light’s around to make circles.” Julie

 

“We all loved our DIY light box. It’s a great use for Christmas lights that would have been back in the loft otherwise!” Tamsyn

 

“A simple set-up; a glow-in the dark bed!” Jennie

 

“Ok, I stand corrected, THIS is Joshua’s favourite activity… And so easy to set up! We started with the glow sticks, and he loved waving those around. We then introduced the torch, and he loved exploring the living room lighting up different objects and trying to chase and stand on the light. Then, Joshua found other toys that lit up – clever little monkey, I hadn’t even thought of that!” Monica

 

“I thought I’d try the glo sticks in balloons as balloons are LO’s favourite but it didn’t really work out. She still had fun though and managed to pop the balloons to get the glo sticks out that were ‘stuck’. After that we moved onto the (temporary) light box, made a smaller one from a lunchbox and we danced with the fairy lights. She wanted her shape links on at the end, she told me the correct names of each one.” Haley

 

“I was really looking forward to this! Unfortunately, Alfie’s been under the weather and as much as he loves his baths and enjoyed helping me throw the glow sticks in the bath he was just not feeling it tonight. We will definitely try again another time!” Lorena

 

“We used a favourite toy of William’s his light up turtle and combined it with glo sticks. William always loves a light show and really loved finding all the places he could hide the glo sticks including down my top and the side of the bed!” Sarah

 

Day 17 – Recycled materials

“His last ever Toucan box arrived, which happened to be based on building with cardboard boxes so I combined the two. He made a catapult (not pictured) and a castle that has become a dragon’s cave.” Jennie

 

“Rather than try and tell William not to go in certain kitchen cupboards we have one filled with safe objects like muffin cases and plastic tubs. It’s an easy way to keep him occupied while I bake. William’s favourite toy of the day was the doorbell that hasn’t made it onto his busy board yet!” Sarah

 

“Practicing fine motor skills today as well as fitting in some colour recognition. Blunt Cocktail Stick Poke, Newspaper Pull and Milk Lid Stacking kept this one amused for a while before nap time.” Haley

 

“A bit of hoopla followed by old fashioned skittles. We did try some textured squares but they didn’t work very well.” Julie

 

1) Used cornflakes and chocolate balls, as well as pasta spirals to poor and shake with our recycled items.  2) Added water to fill and poor, used straws to blow bubbles. Yil

 

“Joshua loved playing with the tug box daddy made him. So easy and inexpensive!” Monica

 

Day 18 – Food Colouring

“Little one found this magical, she loved dripping the coloured water in and watching it move around. Once she mastered the use of the baster she was confident to extract the water herself but found it easier to shake the water out. I’m looking for pipettes for next time as control would be better with those.” Haley

 

“Here’s my son with his edible artwork – toast painted with blue and pink food colouring. He ate every bite!” Jennie

 

“We made coloured rain clouds. Miles really enjoyed this and Ivan had fun watching.” Anneka

 

“We made different coloured ice cubes, using bent pipe cleaners as handles. Joshua seemed interested at first but quickly lost interest. Lovely activity, though, so I think his lack of interest is more due to him teething and not the activity itself!” Monica

 

Looking forwards to Week 4:

Here are 3 activity ideas for each day to get your creative juices flowing. The activities are either taken from our Adventures of Adam blog or provided by our blogging friends. Click on each picture to find out more information about each individual sensory play activity. These ideas are given as a guide. You can follow these ideas exactly, adapt them in some way or think of your own – it is completely up to you.

Day 19 – Cloud Dough

Day 20 – Snow (real or artificial)

Day 21 – Sensory/Discovery Bottles

Day 22 – Beans and/or Lentils Sensory Bin

Day 23 – Exploring Sounds

Day 24 – Sensory Bags

Day 25 – Water Beads

To find out more about our 31 Day Sensory Play Challenge click here.