If your child loves toy cars and busses (what child doesn't?) a sensory toy car wash with shaving cream will help develop their tolerance for uncomfortable sensations like touching things that are messy or sticky.

Sensory Car Wash Instructions

Just like the bubble bath car wash or the exploding toy car wash, setting up this sensory car wash activity is easy!

Materials:

Large tray, such as a baking sheet. You could also use a large rectangle storage bin, or do this on the floor on a shower curtain or outside in a kiddie pool.

Shaving cream. Aerosol shaving cream is best.

Toy cars and trucks, etc. You can tailor the toys to suit your child's interest. For example, toy animals or even foam letters or shapes will work

Towel or waterproof mat to protect your work surface (optional)

MORE: 20 ways to play with toy cars

Set-up

Place the toy vehicles on the tray. Cover the tray and all of the toys with shaving cream. Don't be stingy!

Our experience:

I put shaving cream on an old baking sheet and hid toy cars in mounds of shaving cream and told my son it was a "CAR WASH".

I also gave him a spray bottle and fingernail brush to emphasize the "washing" part of the activity. The only way his cars were going to get clean was if he performed the duty himself!

At first, he was a tiny bit hesitant, but his dad sat down with him and demonstrated how to retrieve and wash the cars and even to drive them around making tracks.

In fact, driving the cars and making tracks turned out to be more fun than the act of washing the vehicles!

It ended up providing at least 45 minutes of fun!

Variation: Use the shaving cream and cars for some imaginative play inspired by the book, Katy and the Big Snow.

The post Shaving Cream Sensory Play Idea: Car Wash appeared first on What Do We Do All Day.

The cardboard box began its new life as an indoor ball game, but my kids quickly decided its true purpose was to become one of their 20 favorite ways to play with toy cars. Toddlers and preschoolers will especially love it!

MORE: These Ugly Kids Activities Are the MOST Awesome

What you need

MORE: Indoor Activities for Kids

Instructions

Remove the top flaps from the cardboard box.

On opposite sides of the box cut out several rectangles. One edge of the rectangles should be the edge of the box where the flaps were removed.

Make the rectangles different widths and heights to add variety to the play tunnel. You can customize the tunnel any way you want, with as many entrances and exits on opposing sides of the box.

You could even create entrances on all four sides. It's up to you.

MORE: Be sure to make this toy road to go with your child's new toy tunnel!

Optional: Use markers to decorate the box tunnel. Our tunnel already had "scores" above the entrances because we used the box for the aforementioned indoor ball game.

How to play

Oh, my friend. Your child will figure this out on their own!

MORE: What is this weird diy toy my kids love?

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Not only are homemade toy garages easier to make than you ever imagined, your child will not even notice that they aren't fancy. That's because kids posses imagination, and sometimes parents need a reminder that ugly kids activities are the most awesome.

DIY Parking Garage Number One

This garage is the one that looks most like an actual, multi-leveled parking garage. And that's not really saying much, but my son loved it.

What you need:

A medium to large cardboard box

Duct tape

Scissors or box cutter

Instructions

Use the scissors to remove the top flaps of the box. Turn the box on its end so that it sits on the shorter sides (i.e. so that it's at it's maximum height). Use the duct tape to secure the two short flaps to the inside of the box as shelves. These will become the floors for two garage levels.

That's it! Now, if your child is driving their toys cars into the parking garage and wish there was a ramp, ask them how they would make one. I bet they have a great answer. If not, try our easy way to make a toy car ramp.

But remember, Barbie's dream house doesn't have stairs, so does a parking garage really need a ramp?

DIY Parking Garage Number Two

This parking garage hardly needs any instructions. Take a cardboard box. Open it. Lay it on it's side.

Voilá.

And hey, you could always reuse the box for this activity that gets siblings to work together. In the corner of the photo you might notice a bit of our diy road for toy cars!

DIY Parking Garage Number Three

Okay, people. Get ready. This might be my son's favorite parking garage of the moment.

Are you ready? First, go to the fridge. Take out a carton of eggs. Put the eggs in a bowl and stick them back in the fridge.

Put the egg carton on the floor. Fill it will toy cars. Instant parking spots.

Kids will always out-imagine grown-ups.

DON'T FORGET: Reuse the egg carton for pom pom counting and sorting

DIY Parking Garage Number Four

Our final diy parking garage idea of the moment will protect those precious toy vehicles from the elements. My son requisitioned our tabletop indoor greenhouse as a parking spot for his toy buses and trains. That's what I get for taking to long too fill it with plants. Although we did eventually use it as a good spot to regrow vegetables from scraps.

And just for fun, grab a clear plastic tube. It makes a great diy parking garage accessory.

So there you have it, four different easy ways to make a parking garage for your child. Which one will you choose?

Idea first published 2011, updated 2023.

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How the Idea Came to Be

I noticed that every single time we bring out the paints and brushes for art time, my toddler requests his toy vehicles. One day I thought, "Why not? What's wrong with letting him smear paint all over them?"

We always used washable paint so even if he changed his mind, he could always give his toy cars a bubble bath, which is his favorite toddler indoor activity, anyway!

Also, look at his bucket of toy vehicles. Don't they look like they could use a paint job?

Painting Toy Cars Activity

You'll be glad to know, this is a very easy toddler activity to set up. Feel free to head outdoors to paint cars on a lovely day, but we stayed inside.

Materials

• Paper
• Paint, preferably washable paint
• Toy vehicles of all sorts
• Paint brushes
• Paper plate

Instructions

Cover your work surface with a piece of paper from a giant paper roll (one of our must-have art supplies). We used extra large binder clips to secure the paper to our dining table.

Optional: Instead of covering the table in paper, you could use a washable mat, but I wanted to give my child the option of creating art on the paper, if the spirit moved him.

Squeeze out several colors of paint onto a paper or plastic plate. Alternatively, use only one color. There is great value in single color art projects.

Allow your toddler to choose which toy vehicles he wants to paint, sit him in the chair and let him paint the toys however he wishes!

Just be sure to set them aside to dry before letting him zoom them all over your white carpet.

MORE: 20 Ways to Play with Toy Cars

Idea first published 2012, updated 2023.

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The obstacle course started out as a simple toy car ramp. It's not pretty or complicated, but my kids didn't care. They loved it, and they loved figuring out ways to make it their own.

Note: this post contains Amazon affiliate links. Qualifying purchases made through these links earn commission.

How to Make a Toy Car Obstacle Course

Follow along as we share how we made our toy car obstacle course!

Instructions

First, make the ramp by propping one of the metal baking sheets on the stack of books. The higher the stack, the steeper the ramp.

Next, continue the road with another baking sheet. Once you are on flat ground, you won't need the metal sheet, but you may want to give the cars a slight off ramp from the sheet to the floor if the lip is too high.

Gather together your Tegu Blocks and start building. How you arrange your blocks is up to you. We placed small blocks randomly so cars would need to swerve around them. Then we created short block tunnels with narrow passageways.

At the end of the course's road, we built a wall with a small opening that cars would need to exit through.

Prop paper rolls along the obstacle course to create tunnels. Tin cans can be strategically located to create "traps" which cars must avoid if they want to finish the course. We had some tin cans with magnets attached, left over from our DIY magnetic building set, and they were the perfect obstacle!

MORE: 20 Ways to Play with Toy Cars

Obstacle Course Variations

If you don't want to use a ramp, you can create an obstacle course directly on the floor. Of course, that means that cars can't race down the hill, but if you make your own road for cars like the one we did, your child will have a fun landscape on which to build the obstacle course.

The variations and obstacles your child can add are endless! Use LEGO blocks, our mystery diy toy or any other toys you can think of to add interest and dimension to the track. The beauty of this toy car play idea is that your child can keep changing things up so each time the cars go for a race, the course is new!

In fact, there may be a lot of traffic jams in your living room's future!

One final note: Yes, my baking sheets are sort of gross looking. However, I like to think that by showing you that my things are not pristine and pretty that you will feel better about your own housekeeping skills. I'm a little lazy when it come to scrubbing grease of my pans. I'd rather be reading.

First published 2013, updated 2023

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How to Make a Toy Car Ramp

Hold on to your hats, it's easier than you think.

Materials

Instructions

Step one. Prop a baking sheet on a stack of book.

Step two. Race vehicles down the ramp!

That's it! Did you think it would be more complicated than that? Nope! In fact, it's so easy, you'll be tempted to try some of the ramp variations.

After you finish that cup of coffee, that is.

Oh, and should you have some cylindrical blocks, they are good for rolling down the ramp, too!

DIY Ramp Variations

Vary the grade of the ramp by using a larger or smaller stack of books.

Use a very sturdy sheet of cardboard to make a longer ramp.

Prop up a longer ramp against a chair.

Use a large mailing tube instead of a baking sheet to create a tunnel.

Add magnetic building blocks to the metal baking sheet to create an obstacle course.

More fail-proof ways to play with toy cars:

• Toy car bubble bath
• Exploding toy car wash
• Toy car sensory play

The post Easy DIY Ramp for Toy Cars Provides Hours of Free Play appeared first on What Do We Do All Day.

We've had several sessions of playing with snow indoors over the years, and by far the favorite is a sensory snow tray traffic jam! Because any time you can add toy vehicles to an activity, it's sure to be a hit! 

I scooped up some snow from the fire escape, brought it inside and spread it out on baking sheets. The boys created a snowy world for their transportation.

The trucks with plows or scoopers saw a lot of action! Be sure to set towels down, but don't worry, it's just water so clean up is easy.

(In order to make you feel good about your own laundry skills I used the grungiest towels I could find for this photo.)

If you don't have snow where you live, you can still recreated this activity. Try a rice sensory tray with cars, a shaving cream traffic jam, or an exploding car wash.

If for some reason, toy vehicles aren't your child's thing, you can use toy animals or blocks. However, sometimes you only need a few items for your kitchen. My son had a great time making snow muffins!

They look yummy, right? Best of all, they are no-bake muffins.

MORE: 18 Snow Day Activities for Kids

Benefits of indoor snow play

This indoor snow play is beneficial for kids!

Free: no fee for the white stuff!

Sensory Exploration: snow is cold and wet!

Observation of Nature: snow melts into water when you bring it inside.

Parent-free Entertainment: I love to enjoy my morning tea in peace with just a little background noise, don't you?

Teaches Responsibility: kids can clean it up themselves.

Of course every indoor snow activity needs a little reading time, wouldn't you agree? Take a peek at our favorite snow books for kids.

The post Indoor Snow Play: A Winter Sensory Activity for Kids appeared first on What Do We Do All Day.

And I mean, what's not to love about trains? Trains go places, they make cool noises, come in all shapes and sizes and best of all, there is always an adventure waiting at the end of the line. So hitch up one of these train gifts to the holiday or birthday engine and your youngest engineer will never want to get off the ride.

Note: this post contains affiliate links that earn commission from qualifying purchases.

Toy Train

Find it: Amazon

You can't go wrong with this colorful, basic wooden toy train. No bells or whistles–kids will make those noises on their own! Train-loving kids somehow manage to carry toy trains around everywhere they go, so even when they're not zooming around the railway at home, you can bet these train cars will be going on adventures.

Signal Station

Find it: Amazon

My kids don't have a lot of specialty items for their tracks but they do have a signal station. Not having too many fancy accessories for train tracks encourages kids to use their imagination and engineering skills to create their own buildings and stations with blocks, which is why we also think unit blocks make the very best gift ever!

Basic Wooden Train Tracks

Find it: Amazon

This is a good, economical, basic train track set that is compatible with all the expensive major name brand train sets. Plus, the reviews are great, so save your money for more train cars to zip around the tracks. Plus, simple sets allow more scope for the imagination!

Local Train Set and Cars

Find it: Amazon

Here's the thing - Thomas is cool and all that, but if you really want to make an impression at a play date, you must have Wooden Railway NYC Subway Cars. Not a NYC fan? (I'll pretend I didn't hear that.) Try a NJ Transit Locomotive, Chicago 'L' Train or a SEPTA Regional Rail train car.

Train Whistle

Find it: Amazon

Young engineers need to alert passengers when they are leaving or coming into the station! How do they do that? With a train whistle, of course!

Train Stickers

Find it: Amazon

All the DK Sticker books are great, no matter what the theme. The more than 60 train stickers are actually reusable (depending on the surface they are adhered to) and some even glow in the dark. Sticker books are excellent on-the-go boredom busters, too!

Conductor Hat

Find it: Amazon

Kids need to look the part when they are engaging in pretend play. Are they going to be the conductor or engineer, today?

Jumbo Floor Puzzle

Find it: Amazon

This alphabet train floor puzzle is 10 feet long so kids really use their whole body while putting it together. That's great for young brains! The puzzle is constructed from thick cardboard so it won't fall to pieces in little hands, and features fun illustrations which also teach the alphabet

Rivers, Roads and Rails

Find it: Amazon

This game requires kids to use their visual perception skills to match cards together and create an ever changing network of rivers, roads and rails. It's like a puzzle and board game in one! The game can be played competitively, or cooperatively.

Ticket to Ride

Find it: Ticket to Ride | My First Journey Ticket to Ride

Ticket to Ride is an immensely popular game in which players collect train cards to criss cross the country via railway, and claim routes. The best part? Grown-ups will enjoy playing the game, too. The original game is best for ages 8 and up, while a new version, "My First Journey" is modified for ages 6 and up.

Train by Elisha Cooper. This gorgeously illustrated book is such a pleasure to read. It follows various trains across the country on their journey. Cooper's trademark attention to detail makes this book a real treat. I love how it opens up wide so the trains really stretch across the pages. Ages 4 and up.

Old Tracks New Tricks by Jessica Peterson. Here's a refreshing change from all those tedious Thomas the Train books. A trio of tracks with friendly faces teach their friends how much fun being creative can be. Delightful. Ages 4 and up.

Locomotive by Brian Floca. Oversized, with loads of detail, stunning illustrations and no shortage of addictive train noises, this book follows an 1869 transcontinental journey. It's one of the few books out there that is good for both preschoolers and older kids, and is immensely satisfying for kids with a train obsession. Ages 4 and up.

How to Train a Train by Jason Carter Eaton. This is a humorous look at what it might be like if kids kept trains as pets. What things would you need to take into consideration when taking care of a train? Does it like warm baths? A gentle goodnight story? An afternoon snack? This book will answer all those pressing questions–and more. It's also an oversized book, which is great for kids who like to sprawl out on the floor to examine their picture books independently. Ages 4 and up.

Steam Train, Dream Train by Sherri Duskey Rinker. This is the followup companion to the best selling Goodnight, Goodnight Construction Site. An animal crew loads freight on a train before it takes a special night time journey. Ages 4 and up.

The Best Book of Trains by Richard Balkwill. This is a short, non-fiction book that has been poured over by both my kids. Its main appeal lies in the photographs of numerous kinds of trains. It includes all the train facts you can possibly memorize as well as a history of locomotives and diesels. Ages 4 and up.

The post Train Gifts for Kids: Books, Toys and Games! appeared first on What Do We Do All Day.

Toy cars can be used for all kinds of play: sensory play, learning, pretend play and outdoor time! So the next time your children get out their buckets of toy cars, roads, train tracks and vehicles of all sizes, shapes and colors, let these photos and ideas be an inspiration for your children!

P.S. There are actually more than 20 ideas below. 😉

Sensory Toy Car Play Ideas

Stuck inside in winter? Bring the outdoors in and create a snowy scene for an indoor snow traffic jam.

Bubble Bath Car Wash. For many years before kid activity blogs exploded on the internet, this was the most popular post on this blog. It is so simple and yet keeps kids busy for hours!

Drive Them Through a Sensory Tray. You can fill a baking tray with any number of things. Some of our favorite fillers have been dried beans, and old expired grains like rice or millet.

Exploding Car Wash! Give the classic bubble bath toy car wash a volcanic twist!

Young children can sit at the table and give cars a sponge bath. Include a small plastic container of water and a sponge.

This activity takes a little time to set up, but if your kids love the book Katy and the Big Snow they will adore this toy vehicle activity that offers up several variations.

Set up a shaving cream car wash. For the ultimate sensory experience use shaving cream. You'll need to use the kind in aerosol cans. Beware, it can have a strong menthol smell, but cleans up very easily!

Stick them in play dough. Whip up a batch of no-cook play dough or use the store-bought kind. Include toy vehicles and other tools for extensive pretend play that works the imagination and fine motor skills!

MORE: 20 Independent Play Activities for Kids

Pretend Play Toy Car Activities

Toy vehicles of all kinds are a natural addition to any child's pretend play repertoire! Here are some incredibly easy ways we have made toy car play even more entertaining.

Roll cars down a ramp. Prop up a baking tray on a stack of books for endless fun! Kids will love experimenting with height and how fast each car can go.

Get out the blocks, create a city or make a few towers and stack them on LEGO.

Turn a cardboard box into a series of tunnels by carving out doorways. Then line up cars to drive through or create a pile-up inside!

Prove that beauty is a not requirement for fun and park cars in a (very ugly) diy toy car parking garage. Create a multi-leveled garage by taping in cardboard cut to size. Alternatively just use an empty box - no "fancy" parking levels required.

Park cars in a recycled container garage. I was surprised at how utterly enchanted the kids were by this ridiculously ugly thingamajig I put together with some recyclables!

Make a road and habitat on poster board. You can also use butcher paper for this. If you prefer, your kids can decorate the paper and draw their own roads and landmarks.

Outdoor Toy Car Activity Ideas

I'm sure your kids have clung to their little toy car friends even as you tried to leave home. Let them take them to the park and playground!

Take them to the playground on hot days when the playground sprinklers are on and soak cars in a bucket.

Do a little off-roading on rocks at the park.

Dig roads in the sandbox -- even in winter!

Learn with Toy Cars

Cars can be incredibly great tools for learning. Here are some simple ways kids can learn concepts even when they think all they are doing is goofing around!

Cars are cheaper by the dozen. Count them out and put them in egg cartons.

Explore geometry and form a grid with them on the floor.

Gather the cars together and then sort them by color.

Explore your artistic side and paint them. Use washable paints because you might change your mind!

(Not pictured) Learn basic math sums with an addition parking lot. Best for elementary aged kids who have some math skills.

And finally, a bonus! One day I opened a box and put it out for recycling only to discover the boys had appropriated it as their newest road. Kiddo even said, "thanks, mom, for keeping this box for us!"

You're welcome, Kiddo.

More fun:

• Pretend play prompts
• Make your own bookmobile with this free printable template
• Make your own subway train cars with this coloring page train template

The post Stuck in Traffic: 20 Toy Car Play Ideas appeared first on What Do We Do All Day.

Katy and the Big Snow Activity

One of our favorite books to read during the winter months is Katy and the Big Snow by Virginia Lee Burton. Although Burton is probably more well known for The Little House and Mike Mulligan and the Steam Shovel, Katy is our personal favorite.

Katy is a spunky red crawler tractor. In the summer, she's a bulldozer, and in the winter, she a snowplow. Katy loves her job. In fact, "the harder and tougher the job the better she liked it."

One winter morning, snow begins to fall, and it soon becomes very apparent that the storm has no intention of stopping and that this is "the big snow." Katy is sent out to do her magic, and it's a good thing because pretty soon the entire City of Geoppolis grinds to a halt. Everything is closed and no one else can do their jobs because the roads are impassable. Katy methodically plows her way through the city until Geoppolis is running smoothly again.

One of our favorite spreads in the book is the map of Geoppolis. All of the buildings are numbered, and then, along the perimeter of the page, there's a closeup of each labeled building. It's one of those pictures you really have to stop and study for at least five minutes before moving on.

That picture was the inspiration for this fun, sensory-related extension activity. We decided to make our own city with various types of "snow" that Katy could dig her way out of.

We started with a big yellow poster board (the map of Geoppolis is yellow, so it seemed like an appropriate color). I let my 7-year-old take a straight edge and pencil and map out the roads.

Meanwhile, my five-year-old and four-year-old began creating houses and buildings out of construction paper (and eventually, after the roads were permanently preserved in black Sharpie, the seven-year-old joined them). They made multicolored houses, apartment buildings, a fire station, a school, and a park.

Then they arranged them in the empty squares and glued them in place.

It was then time to deliberate the name of our city. Everyone made a suggestion, and we eventually settled on Lemonopolis, chosen because of the yellow color of the roads and our wish to pay tribute to the book (although my five-year-old really wanted Amperville because we had just finished reading Ragweed aloud, and that's the name of the city in the story).

We took it to the copy store and had the whole thing laminated to protect their handiwork because things were about to get messy!

We let it "snow" on Lemonopolis, and our very own Katy came and plowed the streets.

The first snowfall bore a striking resemblance to salt. It was fine and gritty and scooped up beautifully into piles. (It also drifted around the kitchen quite easily, and I was stepping on tiny grains for quite awhile after--just warning you.)

The next snowfall looked more like flour. Although we do a fair amount of baking at our house, I don't think my kids had ever really had the opportunity to touch flour. They loved it. It was soft and powdery and delightful to push around, either with their cars or their hands. By the end, they looked like little snowmen themselves.

Our next storm brought in real snow, which we happened to still have sitting around in the backyard. Their playtime with it was cut a little short because it froze their hands and melted in puddles, but it felt very authentic.

And finally, there was a shaving cream snowfall. Katy met her match with this one. It was goopy and squishy and clumped itself around her. My kids quickly abandoned her in favor of just scooping it up with their hands and smearing it around on the mat.

This has been the activity that just keeps on giving. My kids have been jointly invested in this project, exercising their creativity and making plans and playing together. The sensory experience of playing with the different types of "snow" has made the whole thing very real and tactile. It has brought the story of Katy to life for them. We just keep thinking of new elements in which to test Katy's prowess (rice next? or sand?). Instead of just helping us through one afternoon, it has gotten us through several weeks of winter.

I will admit that the thought crossed my mind several times that this would be a fun summer activity. You know, in the grass where the cleanup would be a snap. In some ways, that would defeat the purpose since it makes sense to act out a story about snow in the wintertime, but in other ways, it would be perfect. You could even just create your city with chalk on the driveway and bring in other types of disasters--maybe a mudslide or a leaf storm. The possibilities are endless.

I would love to hear about other sensory activities you've done with your kids. And also, what is your favorite book by Virginia Lee Burton?

Be sure to visit some of Amy's other posts!

On Sunlit Pages:

• How to make a home library
• Reading Farmer Boy
• 5 things I started doing in 2015 that changed my life for the better
• How to read more (without neglecting your children)

On this blog:

• Developing a love of audiobooks
• How to memorize poetry with kids
• Giant hug book and craft

Amy is an avid reader and the mother of four rambunctious boys. Her life goal is to make them as obsessed with books as she is. (Judging from the dozens of books scattered all over her house, she has been successful so far.) She blogs at Sunlit Pages where she writes about a variety of books – from what she is currently reading to her kids’ favorite picture books.

The post Katy and the Big Snow Activity: Sensory Play appeared first on What Do We Do All Day.