DIY Button Up Game

This is a super quick DIY game, which can keep toddlers busy for quite a long time. I made this game when my son turned 2 and when I noticed that he loved to play with my buttons. Now aged 3, he still likes to play with it. While buttoning up all the different and colourful shapes he totally forgets time and is so concentrated that he is biting his tongue. Awww. 🙂

Here are all 21 shapes that I made:

How-to-play ideas:

1. When all shapes are on(off) the yarn, (un)button them (up).
2. (Un)button them (up) according to either color (e.g., blue ones first) or shape (e.g. moons first).
3. Remove all shapes from the yarn and lay them in front of you. Tell a story that features all the shapes. As soon as a new shape is mentioned, the little one is supposed to button up the respective shape. An example for such a story would be: In the middle of the night, when everyone was fast asleep except for the moon (shape 1), there was suddenly a sound that became louder and louder. Below him the moon saw a car (shape 2) driving along the highway. When he looked closely, he noticed two stars (shapes 3 and 4) sitting in the car and fighting over who is going to steer next. No surprise that it did not take long until the car spun out of control and almost bumped into a tree (shape 5). One of the stars fell out of the car, rolled down a little hill, and stopped in front of a snowman (shape 6). He immediately fell in love (shape 7) and… 
4. Prepare everything as in version 4. But this time your kid decides the order of shapes to be buttoned up, and you or both of you come up with a story.

List of materials:

1. Felt or other fray-free fabric (different colours are great)
2. Pinking scissors
3. Cookie cutter (optional!)
4. Knife or standard scissors
5. A 3.9 inches (i.e., 10 cm) long piece of yarn
6. One big button
7. Embroidery needle

I can highly recommend the following items (please note that the links below are affiliate links):

      

Directions: 

STEP 1: Trace shapes of cookie cutters onto felt and cut the shapes using pinking scissors. Other shapes—such as boat, cloud, bell, snowman, tree, mushroom, car, and fish—I cut free hand. Using a knife or standard scissors make one cut into each shape. Make sure that this cut is long enough to easily guide the button through. Depending on the shape I either made horizontal (e.g., cloud, car) or vertical cuts (e.g., heart, snowman) to ensure that the cut is never too close to the edge of a shape.

STEP 2: Attach one end of the yarn to the button and the other to a small piece of felt. I sewed it on (see below) using an embroidery needle. If you want to use longer yarn, make sure that it is not too long. Otherwise it will tangle up during the game and ruin the kid’s patience… I know what I am talking about. 😉

That’s it. Super fast and super easy! Hope your little one is going to have a lot of fun.

I am linking this to Kiddikram, Talented Tuesday, and Threading My Way.

Please click here and leave a comment…. Ich freue mich auch sehr über Kommentare auf Deutsch.