Eyeball Squish Bags Contained Sensory Play for Halloween

My daughter loves squish bags! I made these last year for one of the favors given out at her Halloween party. They were very easy to make and I thought they were super cute, and extra squishy!

Take a look.

What kid wouldn't love one of these?

What you'll need to make them:
-Sandwich sized Ziploc bags
- Clear hair gel (can purchase this at dollar store)
- Food coloring, whatever colors you want. I only have pictures of orange and blue, but I also made neon green, yellow, and pink/red. I tried to give kids their favorite color.
- I added a few squishy eyeballs to each bag. They are relatively cheap, about $2 for 12 of them. Not bad. They're at Party City every year around Halloween time. Here's a link also for all you online shoppers

I promise you, kids will love these! You probably won't be able to resist playing with one yourself.

"Jesus Loves Me" Easter Squish Bag

First in this post I just want to say that we are not a family that is religious connecting with Catholic or Christian religions. However, I'm going to educate my daughter on all religions and let her choose the one she connects closest with. So, as a part of educating her on all holidays, I do tell her what Easter and certain other holidays are "really" all about. She thinks all the crosses and Jesus stuff is adorable and it's very innocent letting her play with this squish bag and talking about the "real" meaning of Easter originally. Whether your family is religious or not, if you're homeschooling, it's still important to discuss all of this at some point, especially since it is what a lot of people believe in. We'll discuss in way more depth once she's middle school to high school aged. Anyway! Here's the "Jesus Loves Me" Easter Squish Bag that I made for her!

It is super cute!

To make a squish bag like this for your little one you'll need:

- A Ziploc bag (I used sandwich sized)

- Craft foam "Jesus Loves Me" hearts and crosses. You may be able to find the sticker kind, or the kind that's just foam at your craft store. Either one works fine, we used some of both in ours.

- Clear hair gel (can be purchased at Dollar Tree)

- Yellow food coloring

- Masking tape

Step 1:

Squirt enough clear hair gel into the Ziploc bag. It's really your call, you'll have to feel around with it. There's no exact measurement. Once you've got enough add in some drops of the yellow food coloring and mix that around with your fingers. Be careful, too much yellow food coloring turns to orange very, very quickly!

Note: during this step don't get the part where it zips shut wet with hair gel or you'll have a harder time sealing it up when finished. You can zip it shut when mixing and be careful to not squish the gel up to the very top during.

Step 2:

Open the bag and add in the "Jesus Loves Me" hearts and the crosses. You can stick them in to the hair gel a bit, or just lay them in there. Then zip the bag shut and move them around a bit.

Step 3:

Put some masking tape around the top and bottom of the bag so it can't be opened or get a hole on one of the bottom corners.

Step 4:

Give it to your little one! Show them how to squish it and move the objects around with their fingers. This will hone their fine motor skills.

Spring Time Squish Bags

Squish bags are a really fun way for babies to get involved in sensory play without as big of a risk of them ingesting some of the materials. They're also great for toddlers honing their fine motor skills to push and "squish" the objects inside the bags around. You can make one for almost any theme. The one here is Spring themed.

The first step in making a squish bag is always adding the thing that's going to make it "squish" How much you'll need depends on the size of your Ziploc bag. I used a gallon bag for this one, with almost an entire container of dollar store hair gel squirted into it. The hair gel I purchased was light blue. You can find one like this, or get a clear one and use food coloring to color it whatever color you would like. To do that add the hair gel to the bag, then a few drops of food coloring, zip the bag and mix around with your fingers from the outside until it's all colored.

After adding all the hair gel I shook in some multi-colored glitter, tossed in some beads, and then for the "Spring" theme added some craft foam insects. Butterflies, dragonflies, those sort of things.

My daughter and her little cousin both really enjoyed this squish bag.

Note: It's a good idea to use duct tape to seal the opening of the bag.