14 Month Old Activities: Week 3

My toddler is now fully walking (hooray!). He understands so much and is talking all the time. K also has a newfound love for bubbles and often asks for them too. So I altered some of this week’s 14 month old activities with these things in mind.

 

So this week’s activities involved:

• A challenging game of hide and seek
• Making berry bliss balls
• Drawing with paint sticks
• Shaving foam and ice messy play
• Orange water play with bubbles

 

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Hide and Seek

 

Hide and seek and chasing games are a great way to keep a toddler occupied. They also help to tire them out too! This week I made our usual game of hide and seek a bit more challenging.

 

First I made small picture cards of different rooms in the house using Canva. Then I gave K a picture card and said the room name. After this, I said, ‘Mummy hiding in (the room name) ‘  and went and hid. Whilst I was hiding, I kept calling his name and repeating the phrase of where I was hiding.

 

We’ve only tried this game upstairs so far. But I think he understands where Mummy and Daddy’s room is all ready.

 

Berry Breakfast Balls

 

I like to have snacks in the house but don’t always have time to make my own. So over the last few months, I’ve tried to make them with K and turn it into an activity.

 

Some of the things that make baking with my toddler easier are: 

• Using a learning tower so he can see, touch and explore the ingredients. 
• Putting a tray in front of him and putting some of the ingredients onto it 
• Helping him to mix by holding his hand
• Giving him utensils to hold and play with
• Giving him a snack afterwards so that I have time to tidy up

 

There wasn’t too much for K to help with when following this recipe but he enjoyed sampling the mixture before I had rolled them into balls.

I did add a tsp of honey to ours to sweeten them up a bit and used mixed berries rather than just blueberries. We both loved the taste of them and they were all gone by the end of the week.

 

Drawing with Paint Sticks

 

 

I’ve tried to give K different opportunities to make marks over the last few weeks by setting up a crayon tuff tray and portrait mark making.

 

This week I gave K paint sticks to make marks with.

 

I bought these a while ago and forgot about them. But I wish we had of started using them sooner! They’re mess-free and easy to wipe off surfaces. They made better marks compared to crayons and they don’t dry out.

 

This activity was so easy to set up. I taped a big sheet of easel paper to the edge of the kitchen counter, took the lids off of the paint sticks and put the sticks in a tray. (The lids were put out of reach).

 

When I saw K losing interest in mark-making, I drew some pictures on the side and talked about them. This encouraged him to try and make more marks. There were a few times where he tried to draw on one of the doors close to him but it was a good teaching moment and the marks easily wiped off.

 

Shaving Foam and Ice Messy Play

I originally saw the idea of combining shaving foam and ice on Pinterest. I used our tuff tray and it was so easy to set up. It took less than 5 minutes to do! Next time I think I will do it outside because the floor became messy when K tried to play and touch other things with his foamy hands.

 

I filled sand moulds with food colouring and water and put them in the freezer the night before. Then on the day, I squirted the shaving foam in the tuff tray, popped the ice out of the moulds and added in some other small sand toys, such as spades. I also added in some reusable silver ice cubes.

 

K didn’t like touching the shaving foam very much but he still got very messy and needed a bath afterwards! Having said this, he was very interested in the ice and he kept coming back to touch it. It was a good opportunity to teach him the word cold. Once the ice had melted, it turned the shaving foam different colours.

 

Orange Water Play

 

So far this month I have set up red-themed water play and green-themed water play as 14 month old activities too. 

 

This week I created orange water play but made a bubble solution to add a bit of variety. 

 

To set this up I mixed Child’s Farm body wash (K has really sensitive skin) with water and food colouring. I didn’t use measurements but ½ a cup of body wash and 1 cup of water should work. 

 

I let k play in the coloured water mixture for a little bit before adding a straw and blowing bubbles. 

 

K was interested in this activity for at least 20 minutes. He stood in his learning tower and played with it by the sink. Doing it by the sink made clearing away much easier.

 

Sticky Picture – Additional Activity

 

In addition to the planned activities, I also set up a sticky picture art activity using K’s Flisat Table from IKEA. I stuck contact paper sticky side up and created circles using a craft hole punch and different coloured paper. This activity was great for developing K’s fine motor skills. We have done a similar activity to this previously that involved pom poms but this one provided more of a challenge. 

 

At first, he was more interested in taking the circles off of the sticky paper. But he kept returning to the activity. 

 

Busy Baskets

If you’ve read my other blog posts you will know I rotate most of K’s toys by putting busy baskets around the house. I often also set up mini 14 month old activities that k can do independently in these baskets too. 

I kept out the farmyard posting box from last week as K was and still is very much interested in this. Then I created a horse busy basket and a recycled materials basket. 

 

Horse Themed Busy Basket

To create this basket I used our horse fine motor lacing toy that I made last week. I also added a horse from our farmyard animals set and a talking tin that played the horse noise when pressed.

 

I kept this basket in sight at all times because of the string on the toy. I helped K use the lacing toy throughout the week and he got better at pulling the string all the way through the hole. 

 

Recycled materials basket

I used a wooden plate organiser from the cupboard and cut up a cardboard tube for this basket. I then showed k how to put them onto the prongs. He returned to it a few times and loved putting them on and taking them off again

 

Conclusion 

So there are the easy 14 month old activities we’ve been doing this week.

 

How have you kept your 14 month old busy this week? Let me know in the comments section below. 

 

If you enjoyed reading about this week’s activities, make sure you check back for next week’s! We have taste safe slime and other things planned.