30+ Busy Box Daily Activity Ideas for Toddlers and Kids

Busy boxes. Quiet bins. Activity bags. Whatever you choose to call them, they are a godsend when you are at a loss for how to keep your kids occupied for a good 30 minutes or more so you can just get dinner started, work on laundry, or concentrate on whatever adult thing you are desperately trying to do.

WHAT IS A BUSY BOX?

Busy boxes or bags are essentially a box or bag filled with just the items needed for one activity like a craft, blocks, coloring, or toys. You needn’t put a bunch of energy into them. It can be as simple as a set of toys that your child hasn’t seen in a while. In fact, why not hide seldom played-with toys away so that when you put them out in a Busy Box it’s new and exciting again.

What I like about Busy Boxes is that once you get in the habit of assembling them, which can be once a week, they become a much-anticipated part of the day for both the kids and adults.

WHEN DO YOU USE A BUSY BOX?

You can choose to pull out your Busy Boxes at whatever time of day is your problem area. For some parents that might be early in the morning when your early risers burst into the day with a ton of energy and you need to collect yourself and make breakfast. It could be a work hour, when you need to clean, make a call, send out emails, or focus on something. It can even be when you just want some peace in the middle of the day to do something completely nice for yourself.  Or maybe your trouble spot is the late afternoon or early evening when you are desperately trying to get dinner going. Whatever time of day you choose to unleash the Busy Box, you will be grateful that you put the forethought into these things on Sunday.

BENEFITS OF BUSY BOXES

While I’m speaking (not so selflessly) as the adult in the situation, desperately trying to get a few peaceful moments, these boxes are actually very beneficial for the kids too because it is engaging them in some independent play and teaching them that they don’t have to be completely and annoyingly counting on you, the parent, to entertain them every second of the day. As many wise parents have said before me, “you aren’t the cruise director for your kids.”

HOW TO INCORPORATE BUSY BOXES INTO YOUR LIFE

FIND BOXES

When I started this project I purchased one shoebox-sized box for everyday of the week (7) and one big box to keep all of the supplies in. If you have multiple kids you might want one box per kid per day of the week. You can choose to label the boxes with days of the week or keep unlabeled and randomly pick one whenever you need it.

GATHER SUPPLIES

I shopped for the majority of the craft items all in one trip to a craft store but you can also try the craft section of Walmart or just find supplies you already have at home. Don’t forget you don’t even have to be crafty! Look for older, forgotten toys to stuff in the boxes too.

PREPARE BOXES ONCE A WEEK

On Sundays (or whatever day you choose) empty out all of the previous week’s boxes and refill each box using ideas from my list and supplies from your big supply bin. You can always add ideas to the list as you come across them.

GET BUSY

When you need some quiet time during the day, pull out a Busy Box and help your child set it up for a minute or so, then encourage them to play all by themselves. When your child is finished with the Busy Box encourage them to help put supplies back in the box.

STORE IT

Store Busy Boxes in a hidden away place, so kids can’t get into them whenever they want. The idea is to keep what’s inside fresh and interesting and if they play with the supplies and toys all the time, it won’t be as fascinating to them.

((So, get to the Busy Box ideas already, blogger!! Dang these people always take forever in getting to the point.))

Without further unprofessional advice and opinions, here are some really lovely Busy Box kid activities to keep your little ones occupied for at least 15 minutes, and with any luck, longer.

Keep in mind you should use your best judgment as to whether your child is old enough for a certain activity and adapt them accordingly to age appropriate activities.

30+ BUSY BOX DAILY KID ACTIVITIES

1. Building blocks. Tons of fun. Use whatever blocks you have.
2. Decorating Sugar Cookies. Play dough + mini rolling pin + cookie cutters + beads + sequins. Roll out play dough, cut out shapes with cookie cutters and have kids decorate with beads and sequins.
3. Coloring. Crayons or markers + coloring page. Just like it sounds. Let your kids color in a coloring book page.
4. Ball Scooping. Toy shovel + bowl + cotton balls or pompoms. Have child scoop balls into bowl.
5. Baby Scarf Pull. Scarves + empty tissue box. Stuff scarves into an empty tissue box and let your kid pull them out.
6. Tape Escape. Tape + small toys. Tape small toys like cars or animals to the lid of the box or to a piece of cardboard and let your child free them.
7. Color Sorting. Colored bowls + colored toys. Put a few colored plates or bowls in with corresponding colored toys or pompoms and let your child sort the toys by color.
8. Jewelry Making. Yarn or pipe cleaners + beads, buttons, or cut up straws. Kids can string beads, buttons, or cut up straws onto pipe cleaners (easier) or yarn to make bracelets and necklaces.
9. Felt Shape Bedazzling. Felt shapes (you can cut out pumpkins/gingerbread men/trees/human face/chicks/eggs/etc) + google eyes + glue sticks + pipe cleaners + small felt shapes. Before hand, cut shapes out of felt using cookie cutters as a guide. Cut out smaller shapes like eyes, circles, etc for decorating if desired. Let kids decorate the seasonal felt shape to their hearts desire with felt shapes, sticky gems, google eyes, pompoms, feathers, and pipe cleaners, using glue.
10. Lego Land. Lego people +variety of Lego building pieces. Go!
11. Paper Decorating. Stickers + construction paper + crayons + kid scissors. Let your kids get creative with this one.
12. Cutting Box. Kid-safe scissors + things to cut like scraps of paper, paper straws, or feathers. Strangely fun for kids. Just let them snip away.
13. Cardboard Town. Cardboard + glue stick + gems, etc. Cut house shapes cut out of cardboard and draw windows and doors with marker before hand. Leave in box with glue, gems, google eyes, crayons, etc. Have kids decorate.
14. Clothespin Butterflies. Cupcake liners + clothespins + glue stick + crayons + markers. Kids can make butterflies by folding two liners in half and then in half again to make a wedge shape. Glue the two tips together then clip with the clothespin to make the butterfly then use markers to draw a face and crayons to color the body.
15. Craft Box. Scraps of fun scrapbook paper + blank cards + toilet paper rolls + glue sticks + kid scissors + yard + ribbon + silk flowers + whatever. Older kids will love making something fun and unique.
16. Baby Pompom Box. Cotton balls + colored pompoms + toilet paper rolls or cardboard rings. Have baby play with balls and put into rolls to come out the other side. You could even take it a step further and tape the rolls to a cabinet or wall vertically for baby to put the balls in.
17. Baby Toy Discovery Box. Packing paper or tissue paper + small toys. Hide small toys in packing paper or tissue paper and let baby pull everything out and play with.
18. Wooden Dress-up Dolls. Popsicle sticks or doll-shaped clothespins + pipe cleaners. Draw faces on the popsicle sticks or doll clothespins and have kids dress the little wooden people with pipe cleaner “clothes.”
19. Seashell Explorer. Brown play dough or kinetic sand + seashells. Kids can discover seashells hidden in the “sand” and then pat down dough and practice making imprints with the shells.
20. Tunnel Games. Cardstock + tape + balls or cars. Cut a rectangle of cardstock and tape down in a semi circle shape onto a large piece of paper to make tunnels. Let kids roll balls and cars through the tunnels.
21. Water Painting. Construction paper + paint brushes + bowl + water. Cut shapes from construction paper and, if needed, tape down to a table for little ones. Include a small bowl and fill it with water. Use paint brushes to paint water on shapes.
22. Lego Duplo Block Patterns. White paper + colored pencils + Lego Duplo blocks. Before hand, cut rectangular strips of white paper and quickly color block-like shapes in colors so your kids can match the patterns with the building blocks. For example scribble out a block of red, yellow, green, red, yellow, green and leave it in the box with several other patterns. Then the kids will have to build a stack to match your pattern.
23. Colorful Flowers or Snowflakes. Paper doilies + crayons. Let kids color doilies in shades of blue for snowflakes or a rainbow of colors for flowers.
24. Stick Farm. Farm animals + popsicle sticks. Kids use popsicle sticks to make little fenced pastures and barns, put animals inside, and make up fun farm scenarios.
25. Baking Cupcakes. Large pompoms + cupcake liners + sequins or felt shapes. Little ones can make cupcakes of all varieties with different colored giant pompoms and sequins or small felt pieces for sprinkles.
26. Sand Paper Letters. Squares of rough (not fine) sandpaper + yarn + marker you can part with. Write one letter of the alphabet on each square of sandpaper with a marker (it will get ruined for this!) and cut yarn into small strands. Little kids can trace the letters with the yarn.
27. Watermelon Slices. Pink paper plate + green yarn.Cut plate into quarters to make “watermelon slices” then hole punch holes along the edge where the rind would be. Kids can thread the green yarn through the holes and wrap around over and over again to make the rind.
28. Bird Feeders. Cheerios + Pipe Cleaners. Children can thread the cheerios onto the pipe cleaners then twist into a circle and hang outside for birds.
29. Feathered Friends. Feathers + styrofoam balls + google eyes + pipe cleaner. Before hand, glue the eyes to the ball and stick a small piece of pipe cleaner into the Styrofoam for a beak. Have the kids decorate the birds or turkeys with colored feathers by sticking the feathers into the foam ball.
30. Paper Creatures. Sheet of paper + google eyes + crayons. Before hand, glue two google eyes to several sheet of paper. Then, let kids draw around them with crayons to create monsters, animals, people, whatever they want!
31. Tissue Ghosts. Tissue + pipe cleaners + black markers. Littles can make ghosts by balling up a tissue for a head then draping another tissue over it. Secure with a pipe cleaner around the “neck” then draw a face with the marker.

GET A FREE PRINTABLE BUSY BOX CHECKLIST

If you love this idea and want a handy checklist to print out and keep with you, sign up for free access to my printable library in the box below. There you will find this Busy Box idea checklist under the Family section along with some other good stuff.