Hellobee

One of Crumb’s favorite summer activities was playing in his water table outside. Mr. Cookie’s parents bought this one for Crumb as an early birthday gift and instead of keeping it in the garage all fall and winter, I decided to use it as a sensory table in our basement. The cleaning process involved rinsing out dirt with the hose outside, a cleaning spray and Clorox wipes, a vinegar rinse, and finally just soap and water. It still looks slightly stained on the bottom in some of the crevices, but that’s what we get for leaving water in it all summer. It’s clean enough to play with at least!

In our kitchen, Crumb has an oatmeal sensory bin that he plays with using his trucks and dinosaurs and I often make him a soapy water bin so he can “help” with washing the dishes. For the table in the basement, I did not want any sort of food because bugs, basements, and dry goods don’t mix. That eliminated a lot of great options like rice, beans, seeds, pasta, and more. I also didn’t want anything from the outdoors that would be messy and difficult to clean up like sand, leaves, or wood chips. My final criteria (so difficult I know!) was to keep this project as inexpensive as possible since I was filling a whole table. I searched a bit online and finally it hit me — colored pom poms! I ordered a bag of 750 balls of different sizes on Amazon for a little under 10 dollars. The pom pom balls looked great but then I added a bag of leftover cotton balls to make the table look fuller and the cotton balls started to fall apart almost immediately. In retrospect, I should have just bought two bags of the poms.

I’m happy that the pom pom balls are soft so they can be thrown and dumped without hurting anybody.  They are also small and easy to play with but not small enough that they will be difficult to pick up off the carpet, which is where they will inevitably end up. Best of all, Crumb and Chip seem to love the new sensory table! Crumb immediately began stacking and spinning them in the middle funnel piece, and I used the purple catapult to send them across the room. Although Chip is not allowed to touch the pom poms because he’ll put them in his mouth, he loves looking at the bright colors and watching his brother play.

Here are a few more ideas for non-food ways to fill a sensory table:

Shredded Paper

Fabric

Beads

Bubble Wrap

Alphabet Letters

Sponges

Colored Easter Grass

Have you made a sensory bin or table for your LO?