Sensory Bins

Finally, right?!

Right now we have three bins made with two in rotation. The first one is a Christmas one, and since Christmas is over, it's been put away until next year.

Here's a picture of the Christmas bin:

I got all of the items from Hobby Lobby when they had their Christmas sale at 90% off. It has:

mini pine cones

blue fuzzy pom poms

white fuzzy pom poms

red fuzzy pom poms

a clear bead tree garland

mini presents

snowmen

felt Christmas trees

white sparkly snow flakes

silver sparkly snow flakes

glittery candy canes

I plan on adding to it later on as well. At her age she gets to notice the different shapes, sizes, patterns, colors and textures while she's playing. She can sort the items and as she gets bigger we'll work on sorting into different categories with specific instructions, writing the letter the item begins with, writing what the item is, writing a story about the item, etc. It's something that can really grow with her over the years.

This is the Mardi Gras bin, which is one of the bins that is in rotation right now:

Here's Audrey a while back when I first wrote about the sensory bins and tried to take pictures of them. She sat in it in protest because she wanted her stuff. How dare Mommy try to blog!

I got all of the items from Hobby Lobby and plan on adding to it when stuff goes on sale in March.

It has:

purple feathers

green feathers

yellow feathers

purple felt squares

green felt squares

yellow felt squares

fleur de lis stickers

"Mardi Gras" stickers

Mardi Gras beads

a clear bead garland

purple bells

green bells

yellow bells

And here is our other bin we have out right now, for Valentine's Day:

I got everything from the Dollar Spot in Target (love that section)

It has:

purple plastic hearts

pink plastic hearts

small heart containers

medium heart containers

one large heart container

one heart tin pail

one red tin pail

heart shaped cookie cutters

"X" shaped cookie cutter

"O" shaped cookie cutter

red foam hearts

pink foam hearts

white foam hearts

red paper heart doilies

heart shaped ice cube trays

heart shaped measuring cups

heart shaped erasers

mouth shaped erasers

"I *heart* U" erasers

Audrey is loving using the measuring cups and pails to sort the pink and purple plastic hearts and transferring them from one container to another. She's working on colors, motor skills, sorting and organizing and having fun - you can't beat that.

This is how they end up a lot of the times - stuff strewn about everywhere. But, after the initial trying to sneak away like she didn't do it, she plays with everything and helps clean up her mess. It's good times.

I plan on doing more for each of the seasons and holidays - Spring, Easter, Summer, 4th of July, Fall, Thanksgiving (we don't really do Halloween here), etc.

I love that it's something that can engage all of her senses from this age until she's much older and that Tony and future kids will be able to use and enjoy as well.

And I'll write more later as we do more. I figure we'll move into an Easter one after March 8th (Mardi Gras day/beginning of lent) and then a Spring one after that.