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!
I think this would even be great for little girls that love to play with dolls! Thanks for the great idea!
Can I just buy some from you? Lol… =)
Haha! I wish I had time to make a bunch 🙂
Hello Kim,
Super thanx for sharing this wonderfull idea!
I’m planning on making this perfect toy this week.
I passed your idea on with a link to your site on facebook to a lot of mommy friends, hope (but think) thats okay?! 😀
Thanx again and much fun to you making your beautiful creative stuff and your blog.
Greets, Jasmijn.
Absolutely – I am so happy to hear that you are sharing it with your mommy friends! I hope that their kids enjoy it as much as mine did!! 🙂 thanks for stopping by and for the wonderfully sweet comment!
Such a great idea! My kids are too old for it, but when my 1 year old niece was over 7 being fussy, I remembered that I saw your post pinned on Pinterest and thought I’d give it a try. Super quick to throw together for it (I didn’t decorate the box or do the numbers, though) and she loved it so much I sent her home with it. Thought I’d stop by and say THANKS!
That should have read, “was over *and* being fussy” 🙂
Hi,
LOVE this! Would I be able to buy the immitation wipes from you?
Love this idea!!! Thank you thank you!! My baby will be 7 months at Christmas time and this will be a fun inexpensive gift. I’ll probably need to make a second one for my 2 1/2 year old daughter who loves to use the wipes to change her stuffed animals’ and baby dolls’ diapers. 🙂 Can’t wait!
Awesome!!! Hope your kids love it as much as mine did! GREAT idea for the baby doll wipes!
For the appliques could you use the no-sew heat and bond and just iron it on the fabric instead? I’m not a very good sewer..
Such a fantastic idea! I’ve included information on it in my blog today! Thanks! http://fabricsalad.com/wipe-out-scraps/
I made this project for my 1 and a half year old son but I used fabric crayons to write the numbers 0-10,20, 30, 40, 50, 60, 70, 80, 90, 100 on my squares. Now my 4 year old daughter can practice her number recognition too. Thank you for posting this idea.
I love this idea, and wish I had thought of it a long time ago! When my son was little (eighteen years ago now!!!), his favorite toy for more than a year was a set of clean empty containers with plastic lids. When he wasn’t looking I would put a toy or two into each container and put them back on the shelf where they were kept, and then he would sit and tug the lids off to discover the treasures inside. I used formula cans, and didn’t decorate them, although I think any sort of second-hand container (margarine tubs? the plastic boxes from sandwich meat?) would work great, and they would be cute decorated in some way.
Love the idea, but have a question. My youngest is now 22 and I don’t remember the wipes very well! Do the pieces of cloth have to be folded any certain way so they come out easily? I’d like to make some of these for my kids friends that are having kids!
They don’t really need to be, but you can always fold them one inside of the other so that one comes partly out after another is removed. I found that once my kids realized there were a bunch in the box, they would go in after the wipes for more. It only takes a couple of sessions of playing with them for them to realize there is more in the box even if they don’t see it sticking out!
What a great idea, wished I had thought of that years ago!!! We have 12 (13 on the way) grandchildren. Yes we have gone through many wipes. I babysit for many of them so we have a well stocked home of baby supplies from diapers, wipes, bottles, formula to toys, cribs, stroller etc. we actually look like we still little ones here full time! We love having them here:). We have a granddaughter that will be 1 this month and she is always into the wipes or a box of Kleenex when she can get her hands on them!!! Definitely oing to make a bunch of them plus several of our girls friends are expecting so will add this to thir gift. We do what you do also. I am the more practical one, give the things they will really need & use:) thanks for the wipes toy idea. Brilliant!!!!!!!!
Hope your Granddaughter LOVES it and saves the real wipes from dispersing so quickly! 🙂
What a great idea!!!
I love it!!
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I’m going to make this for my grandson for Christmas. I want to use fabrics that are different textures because he will just be turning 4 months old.
This is a great idea. The only problem is I don’t have scrap fabrics and I cannot find anywhere that sell them cheap. Any idea?
I find scrap material at bins in Walmart, JoAnn Fabric, Hobby Lobby, etc. Good luck.
Neat idea for using flushable washcloths – or not flushable, for such creative things. It is a neat idea, but for “little” babies, the tiny toys bothered me, knowing little ones love to stick things in their mouths..Otherwise. totally neat.
If you read the post – it explains that the little toys were a way to continue playing with the toy AFTER my kids got older. It even reminds parents to be sure their children are past the stage where they put everything in their mouths before adding toys.
I’m getting ready to make this for a friend’s baby who turned 1 today. I have TONS of fleece that I will cut squares from since it also does not fray. Thanks for the idea!
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.
What a great idea! It avoids waste and allows the recycling of old objects. Top