We travel by train quite a bit, and Leon is getting beyond the age where just waving my keys in front of him will distract him. Today I constructed a travel busy bag for him, with ideas from a couple of places online.
I made two quilted texture cards: one pieced from differently-textured scraps from my scrap box, the other from a curtain sample. One of them has buttons on one side, and a zip and a suspender clasp (it was kicking around in the bottom of my bits box & I thought he’d like it) on the other. The second has little scraps of fabric of different types sewn onto it, secured only at one end so they all flap like little tags.
My new headphones have a carrying bag, but I won’t use it, so I used it to hold a bunch of twisted metallic pipecleaners, and a small string of beads, in, for taking in & out & playing with. (Though he’ll need help with the bag.)
I threaded beads onto another pipecleaner, and a metal spring and split ring I found in my bits bag onto a second one.
(The pencilcase to hold it all also came from my box of bits. The carabiner clasp visible there I ditched in the end.) I also tucked in a couple of bits of card, one for folding/playing with, and one with the names of a handful of nursery rhymes & songs written on, for those moments when my brain goes blank.
All zipped up and ready to go! When Leon’s a bit older, I could tuck a couple more bits of paper in, and a couple of pencils into the front pen-holder part. (And, of course, swap out a bunch of the activities for something else.) You can’t see in that photo, but there’s a piece of ribbon attached to the zipper, and most of the activities have a ribbon loop on them, so I can tie the ribbon through the loop while Leon’s playing with them, and hopefully spend less time fishing under the seat for something he’s dropped.
It was fun to make, came entirely of bits and bobs I had lying around, and didn’t take that long. Now we need to go somewhere to test it out!