Sunday, January 6, 2019

365: Bean Day

January 6 is Bean Day. We spend Sundays with my family, so Jude got to play with my niece Elizabeth. Since sensory bins are a favorite in our house, we went with a dried bean bin.

As soon as I sat the bowl down, Jude dragged it to him and shoved his hands in to play with the beans. It was cool to see him start to make that connection and know what to do with the bin. He wiggled the beans around and eventually came up with a Little Person. Liz focused more on using the tools to move the beans individually to a different container. Jude watched Liz as she meticulously moved each bean.

After we played in the beans, Liz decorated a recycled paper towel roll to make a rainstick with the beans. It was simple to make. Color the paper towel roll with markers. Cover one side with paper towel and a rubber band (I used a hair tie because that's all I had). Fill it with the desired amount of beans. Close the other side the same way you did the first. Voila! Your very own homemade rainstick. Both Jude and Liz enjoyed flipping the rainstick over and listening to the sound. It was a fun, quick, and cheap way to celebrate bean day!

finished rainstick
As a parent, my biggest shortcoming is my obsessive need for control, and these daily actives have been incredibly humbling. Each play session I force myself to not hover and let the kids decide how they want to play. It's been hard but the pay out is extraordinary.

I hope some of the posts from this first week have inspired you to play with your little ones!



1 comment:

  1. Are you worried about Jude trying to eat the beans and choking? Remy puts anything and everything into his mouth so I worry about that with some of the sensory activities, especially if they involve food. He'll just view it as a big food bowl'! 😂

    ReplyDelete