With our sweet boy now well out of the sleepy newborn stage, we’ve been having a total blast playing together while his big sister is at school in the mornings. Our little play sessions are more me sitting back and watching him play than anything, but I absolutely love it. It’s such a special thing to watch your little one become interactive, playful, and full of personality, isn’t it? I just adore it and sort of wish that I could freeze time to enjoy this stage a little longer, though I know I’ll think the next stage is just as much fun, or more likely, even better.
Here are a few of the very simple baby play ideas we’ve been enjoying recently…
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1. Mirror Play. This is as simple as placing your little one in front of a full length mirror {or standing in front of a smaller mirror with them in your arms}. They get to inspect their reflection and it’s cute as all get out. Babies enjoy looking at human faces more than anything else, and that moment they realize who is staring back at them? Magical! {We don’t have one yet, but one of these shatter-proof acrylic mirrors is on my wish list for when our playroom gets it’s very own baby play corner.}
2. Floating Balloon Play. Hands down, Sam’s very favourite. Without a word of exaggeration, he can lay on the mattress in our playroom and enjoy watching his heart-shaped balloon move for 20 or 25 minutes at a time. Super simple and it allows babies to explore cause and effect while tracking moving objects too. {See more here.}
3. Keyboard Kick. This one is sort of silly, but Sam’s little legs are constantly moving, so one day I decided to hold Miss G’s miniature keyboard out near his little feet and see what happened… What happened of course is that baby bubba became a little musician, which is ridiculously adorable! ☺ This one is great for exploring cause and effect and his initial reaction was priceless – a combination of confused, surprised, and amazed. We’ll definitely be experimenting with kicking different objects in the near future too.
4. Balloon Swat. This is a fun one! We have this really cool cloth balloon cover that was gifted to us when Miss G was wee and Sam seems super drawn to things that are black and white, so it’s perfect. To play, I simply hold the balloon above his chest and he swats at it with his little arms. This one is great for developing hand-eye coordination and learning cause and effect, and by moving the balloon off to one side, we’ve been encouraging our baby bubba to use his left arm just as much as he likes to use his right.
5. Bell Bracelets. Another one for the mini musician! To create the bracelets, I simply knotted several jingle bells onto a couple of small lengths of elastic cord and tied them into loops. You can slip one onto your baby’s wrist, ankle, or both, and watch them make their bells jingle as they move.
Now it goes without saying that most of these activities require direct supervision, but I think watching is the very best part!
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