Toddler Activity: Pipe cleaners and a colander
I’m forever on the hunt for simple activities that will keep my toddler occupied – the longer the better! And the simpler the better! I heard about using pipe cleaners and a colander as an activity and I thought it was brilliant.
There are so many possibilities! Colour matching, counting, working on fine motor skills, or add some googly eyes and you could even play hair dresser.
Leah didn’t have the patience to be looping the pipe cleaners through the holes more than once per pipe cleaner… maybe another time to make it into her first “sewing” project. But she did think it was fun and spent about 15 minutes occupied with it.
She was totally focused, determined to fill ALL the little holes in the colander. She was a little disappointed that we didn’t actually have enough pipe cleaners to fill all the holes! Good thing I pulled out the small colander for this activity!
I cut the pipe cleaners into thirds to make them go a little further. The more pipe cleaner pieces you have, the longer the activity will last.
And when she ran out of pipe cleaners she pulled them out (well, actually I pulled them out for her) and started again.
Although being the toddler that she is, she lost interest in it shortly after we restarted. But hey, that was 15 minutes that she was sitting quietly by herself while I could have been making dinner or putting on a load of laundry, so that’s a great toddler activity to me.