My First Sensory Bags: Clean and Safe Sensory Play for Baby

I love Sensory Play, but sensory play for a baby who puts everything in her mouth? What about toxins and choking hazards? And the mess! Who has time in their school day to stop and bathe the baby! Well, I solved this problem! Sensory Bags to the rescue!

Safe Sensory Play for Baby with Sensory Bags

Sensory Bags, what's that, you may ask, but really they are super simple to put together, and offer fun and sensory learning for your baby!

What You Need to Make Sensory Bags for Baby

Freezer Bags
Hair Gel
Water Beads
Water
Oil
Food Coloring

How Our Baby Sensory Bag Experiment Went

Start with a storage bag, I used freezer bags because they are thicker than sandwich bags. Then fill it with whatever interesting textured stuff you can come up with.

The first one I made her was filled with hair gel and taped to her exersaucer. I made sure to fold the side with the opening under, so she couldn't accidentally open it, and then I taped the other sides down.

She enjoyed the cool, squishy feeling the sensory bag provided for the couple weeks that she tolerated the exersaucer.

But this kid was in hurry to move, she had been in a hurry since her rapid birth, crawling before any of the others and just really wanting to be bigger than she really was. So we quickly moved on, and as soon as she could pull up to the window we taped some sensory bags to it for her entertainment.

Again we filled one with hair gel, but we also added one with plain water and another with water beads. I really liked how we ended up with a blue color palate too.

I taped these on all 4 sides with clear packing tape to keep them secure.

The water bead one was definitely a favorite! And it was quite pretty when the sun shone through the window.

Having them in the room where we do school was great too. I could keep an eye on the baby, and the 4-year-old was entertained by them as well. It was great to be able to keep the two little kids occupied while I worked with the older kids.

After a week or two, I added a fourth bag as well, a wave bag. Keeping with the blue theme, it contained blue water and vegetable oil. Since the water and oil don't mix it was fun to watch the waves and bubbles created by little (and big) hands.

I can't say for sure how long these were on the windows before they started to wear a bit, but it was a good 2-3 months. Finally, when I started to notice weak spots I took them off. I'm amazed they played with them that long!