If you have an infant you know that you could have thousands of dollars worth of blinky, colorful, noisy toys in your home, but your baby would prefer to pull baby wipes out of their container, right? Turn a wipe container into your babies absolute FAVORITE toy.
This is the culprit hard at work. An inquisitive 7 month old little girl! Do you have one of these at home? If you have an infant I know that you have picked an entire box of wipes off the floor a time or two. My remedy, make them their very own toy that mimics this!
I have been using this trick since my kids were babies. This is a quick, inexpensive, and a totally useful project. I made a ton of these and hid them all over the house, anyplace the kids could reach, they could find one of these. I know what you’re thinking. Now you have to constantly be picking up pieces of fabric throughout the house. Well, I say better to pick up and reuse those pieces of fabric than $3.00 worth of baby wipes over and over!
Add colorful fabric remnants to and wipe container to create a toy that they will play with over and over. Hours of stimulating, and productive play for your infant or toddler.
There is so much about this toy that I love! It is quiet, cute, safe, stimulating, inexpensive, and re purposing things you already have. Little fingers love to push the little button to open the door and pull out the little pieces of colorful fabric.
Your first step is to use up the wipes in a container (that’s easy enough with a baby in the house). Huggies makes some super cute containers and the little door is easy for babies to open. It also has a nice rubber opening so little hands can slide in and out without getting hurt.
Collect pieces of fabric from around the house. This can be as easy or elaborate as you would like. I use scraps of what fabric I have and applique numbers, letters, and shapes onto the fabric. You can see how to applique fabric here. If you are playing with your baby you can work on number, letter, and shape recognition. I also like to use different textures, patterns, and colors to make baby excited to see and feel what is coming next.
If you don’t have fabric laying around just cut up pieces of old t-shirts or towels. You can hem all the edges or just leave them raw, it’s up to you. If you use fabrics like jersey the edges won’t fray. I cut the pieces about the size of a DVD case. Usually about 20 squares is the perfect amount to fit in the container without it getting to hard to pull the pieces out.
Now that my kids are older they still enjoy this toy. Now we add in their favorite little toys and it is fun for them to search for them. Remember not to do this until you kiddo is old enough to not put things in their mouths. Using fabric with their favorite characters is fun too. I tell them to find “Dora” for instance and they see how fast they can pull out the fabric pieces to find her. Hunting for their friends is fun for them.
These are great to make for your own kids and have been kid tested and TOTALLY mother approved in our house! I would recommend this as a gift to make and give to expecting moms or as first birthday gifts. Like I said, of all the toys in our home, this is one of the least expensive but most loved and enjoyed. I hope that you try this and that your kiddos love it as much as mine.
Here is a little bit of a boyish version of the wipe container toy!
What an awesome, very creative, idea. Love it!
What a GENIOUS idea!!! I love it! I have to do this, and I’m making one for the car too. I would love for you to come and link up at my Follow me Friday’s post! http://tipsfromtheheart.blogspot.com
I hope you do give it a try, and thank you! I think we had 10 of these in our house when my kids where really little! – I would love to link up!
Oh wow, this got every one going – fascinating input mixed with a good read.
interesting! although I have no expert, but I want have to know more and more, on your blog just interesting and useful information. Keep it up!
Smart.Just a totally smart idea!
Thank you so much! It was a life (and wipe) saver when my kids where babies!
OK, so I am going home tonight and making one of these for my 18 month old daughter, this girl loves her some wipes, ha! Awesome idea 🙂
AWESOME!! Hope she loves it as much as my kiddos did!
We use cloth diapers and wipes and I keep my wipes dry in a container like this and one of my baby’s favorite things to do is take the wipes out and put them back. Great idea to make a game out of it. 🙂
It’s the simple things that they love the most, isn’t it? 🙂 That is a great idea to keep dry wipes in those containers too – I use them for all sorts of storage too 🙂
This is a great idea!!! Question: Do you put the scraps of fabric in there a certain way (like for them to come out one after the other)or is it easy for the kids to reach inside to get the next one out?
I usually just put them all in (no certain way) but I bet it would work well to fold one inside the other a bit (like wipes come) so that it pulls a piece of another out. Once in a while they clump up and come out in a bunch – I have found that really flexible fabrics like Lycra and jersey work the best.
I have the same question. how do the kids get their fingers in there to pull the next one out after the first one has already been pulled?
This is genius i have lost count of the number of packets of wipes i have had to throw out because my kids have tossed them all over the floor when my back is turned!
I just had a whole box of wipes pulled out. Thanks for the idea!
How do you decorate the tub part? Is that fabric glued to the inside? What kind of glue sticks to plastic? Thanks! Great idea–wish I’d seen this when my kids were little!./
Huggies makes containers that are really cute – this is how they come from the store (no fabric glued on to them).
What a fantastic idea! I actually have a couple wipe containers waiting for a use. I think I found it! 🙂
This is so simple and yet so effective! Your idea is brilliant and really caught my eye on the idearoom.net link up! Well done you! If you don’t mind, I’m going to create a link to your post to include in an article I’m writing about re-purposing everyday objects!? Thanks!
That would be wonderful! I;m glad you found a Spotted Pony and especially glad that you found something you liked! Thanks!
What did you decorate the outside of the box with? Thank you!
Jenn,
The box came just like the pictures from the store. Huggies makes them, and there are lots of cute patterns to choose from!
I love the colors, creativity, and that you’ve repurposed something that is in so many homes. Thanks for sharing!
I was curious if you had a special tecnique for assuring that the next piece of fabric will pop up, like the wipes?
You can absolutely fold one inside of the other (like wipes come packages when you buy a fresh container). That way when you pull one out it pulls the tip of another out too.
This is a fantastic idea, thanks for sharing! My 14 mo. old granddaughter does this all the time with the wipes, I’m going to make this asap for her! ~Marcy
I just saw this and I am going to the store tomorrow to get everything I need to make one of these for my daughter and my nephew… They will love it!!! I am so excited, I am very tempted to go shopping now so I can get started!!! What a great idea I don’t know how I haven’t thought of this by now… Thank you so much for this amazing idea!!!
What a cool idea for a toy,
Wow is all I can say!!! What a wonderful wonderful idea!!! And oh so true…my grandchildren love to pull the wipeys out of the container!!!
Robin – thank you so much for the kind comment! My kids truly loved their wipe container toy to pieces!
Great idea! As soon as I saw this I made it, and the kids loved playing with it today. Can I mention this in our blog?
So glad to hear that your kids enjoy it as much as mine! Absolutely feel free to share the idea and a link to the tutorial! I would be honored.
We had a similar ‘toy’ at our place when my kids were smaller – I put flannels/face washers into a tissue box. Same effect, slightly less robust but still fun 🙂
BRILLIANT! My 10 month old loves to play/waste the wipes in the container, so now i can refill it with the bag of fabric scraps i have! Thank you so much! YOu have saved me so much money! haha And i just love the applique..that i will have to learn next. 😉
Great idea! My kids’ favorite character is Pooh bear and I have the cutest wipe box with him on it. I’ve wanted to do something with is for the longest time. Thanks! They LOVE it! 🙂
This is an an adorable and unique idea! I have a specific question that I’d like to ask you. Would you mind emailing me when you have a second? I can’t find a “contact me” spot on your site 🙂
Fabulous! And here i thought I was clever by hiding things in them and having her open it up and surprise her! These things look like a waste of money at first, but you can use them for tons of stuff. Thanks for the more creative idea! 😀 P.S., I use them in Speech Therapy to teach babies how to communicate “more” and “open”. Great incentive when there’s a fun little surprise in there! You’re an inspiration.
This is such a great idea. I have had 3 kids who loved to pull the wipes out and I always felt like I was two steps behind them. I totally have what I need to make this and this will be my next project for the little one. Thanks for sharing the idea!