Busy Bag Fun

Have you heard of a busy bag party?  I had never heard of such a thing until I was invited to one.  Wow, was I missing out!  As it turns out busy bag parties are a lesson planning mama’s dream come true.

Wondering how a Busy Bag party works?  Lucky for you I have all the details.  Katelyn (our Busy Bag host) sent out an email inviting a group of women to join in this crafty experience.  Everyone was asked to pick a fun kid activity and make that activity seven times.  (seven guests, seven activities)  She set a date for the Busy Bag party and we all met to exchange our bags.  We all came in with 7 identical activities and left with 7 different activities put together with love.

I was so impressed with the effort everyone put into their busy bag activities.  I can’t wait to show you the fun stuff I brought home.  M and M haven’t seen any of it yet.  (So don’t tell!)  I thought this busy bag would be perfect for the first few weeks of summer.

Kacy (mom to a 2 1/2 year old little girl) made these fun Craft Stick Shapes inspired by Chasing Cheerios Making Shapes.  I love that she included a picture for the kids to copy and that each shape has a specific color.  Once the kids have mastered shapes these craft sticks could be used to form all types of objects.  Awesome!

Juliann (mom to a 1 1/2 year old girl) made these clever wood squares.  Each set came in a small draw sting bag.  What I love is that she made each set work for a wide range of ages.  Included in each bag are two sets of numbers from 0-9 and math signs.  For younger kids these squares can work as color matching  or number matching tiles. For older kids she made math signs or the tiles can be used for memory.  Big M is going to love this one.

Mercy (mom to a 2 year old girl) made this Popsicle Matching activity inspired by Planet of the Apels.  They are so cute I just want to sit down and play.  What I love most is that Mercy wrote the name of the color and attached a color swatch on the end of each craft stick.    Great for word recognition!

Britney (mom to a 1  1/2 year old girl) made this Dyed Pasta activity.  You can find the recipe for adding brilliant colors to noodles at Happy Hooligans.  I love, love, love that Britney include three types of lacing tools, and instructions for other activities that could be done with these noodles.

Penny (my sister and mom to 6, 5 and 2 year old girls) made one of our old standbys.  Contact Paper Window Art.  These can be made to fit any time of year and look gorgeous in the window.  Penny did a great job making this one perfect for spring with the flower shape and  pastel tissue paper.

Katelyn (the host and mom to a 3 1/2 year old boy and 1 1/2 year old girl) made ABC Scoops inspired by Little Page Turners.  These will be a great activity for Little M.  Katelyn attached them all with tape so that the younger kids will be able to use them for pretend play before they are ready for letter matching.  Great idea!

I made Spring Play Dough as my contribution.  Check it out!

Hosting tips:  1.  Katelyn used Google Docs for participation sign up.  We were all able to input our kids ages and our planned activity.  2.  We were given a little over a month to prepare our activities and Katelyn did a great job of reminding us along the way.  3. Katelyn provided us with a lot of Busy Bag ideas via Pintrest, which was very helpful!

Now that you know all about busy bags… it’s your turn to start planning!