Our 20 month old is one sassy and active little girl! She is very independent and knows EXACTLY what she wants. Sound familiar? What she does NOT want, ever, is to sit quietly in her car seat, restaurant high chair or church pew. So we are always searching for things that she likes to do. Recently, she has become obsessed, like totally obsessed, with buckles. You know . . . like the buckles on a restaurant high chair. The ones that make the cool sound when you click them. Those are the ones! Well, when little Miss Fidget Pants sees one, she’s done. She has to have it! Kind of like me when I know there is an open bag of chips or cookies in the pantry! She insists, right then and there, that she stand behind the high chair and do the buckle. Over and over and over and over and over (you get the point) again. This girl is obsessed.
So what does the mother of a 20 month old do besides pull her hair out, eat chips and Oreos? She goes on a mission to find some buckles, of course! I turned to my number one go to, Amazon, but found that even a pack of four buckles (like the ones to wrap around your suitcase) was too expensive. So, I turned to my number two go to, Dollar Tree. Surely, they would have some kind of buckle on their hardware isle? They did! In the pet care section! I also picked up tons of goodies for our big 2nd birthday Puppy Party. More about that later.
The girls and I had so much fun picking out about 7 or so dog and cat collars in various sizes and colors. The cat collars (not pictured) are super cute and even have little bells on them (these could pose a choking hazard so you may want to remove them or be sure to supervise this activity at all times). Next, we needed something to attach all of the collars to. What do you know, Dollar Tree sells carabiners! We purchased a large one and two smaller ones since I wasn’t sure which size we would need. In the end, we wound up using the larger size (as seen on the shopping cart below).
After making our purchases we rushed right to the car and assembled our DIY Bucket Activity. We are super excited about how our finished product turned out! We handed it over to Miss 20 month and she literally squealed with delight! She was so excited to get clicking. We immediately put our new gadget to the test and headed to our next errand. Perfect!l The large carabiner clipped right to the shopping cart(purse, high chair, etc)! Miss sassy pants worked on her new buckle activity through our entire trip to Hobby Lobby and Aldi. This activity is great for so many reasons! Fine motor skills and mama sanity are two that come to mind. Now that’s a mama win!! I’m not going to lie, I’m probably going to celebrate with a bag of chips and some Oreos!
How do you keep your little wiggle occupied at restaurants, shopping and church? We would love to hear you ideas! Share in the comments below.
*****Warning: Small parts may pose a choking hazard. Please DO NOT leave child unattended.
*****Warning: Straps may pose a strangling hazard. Please DO NOT leave child unattended.