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We added a morning basket to our everyday routine over a year ago, and it has turned into one of my (and my daughter’s) favorite parts of the day! Before I share what’s in it and how we use it, I thought I’d explain a little bit about what it is.
Contrary to its name, a morning basket is not limited to only being used in the morning, and it does not need to be an actual basket. It can be used any time of day and could be a designated desk, shelf or any kind of container. A morning basket holds several toys or activities for your child to explore that engages their mind and keeps them entertained. It can also be tailored to any age!
We’ve been using Tiny Theologians’ ABCs of God’s Attributes cards for our memory verses and have been working our way through Then Sings My Soul Hymn Journal, so I keep those in her basket along with this Coloring Keepsake Bible that we read every morning.
MORNING BINDER
We also have what we call our “morning binder” with dry-erase (these are the BEST washable dry-erase markers) and velcro activities. I laminate all the pages (here are the links to our laminator and pouches) and keep them all in a 3-ring binder. Here are all the printables I keep in ours:
- These custom name tracing sheets are the cutest! We have the princess one.
- Alphabet and Number tracing sheets from Arrows & Applesauce. These were freebies from joining her email list.
- Shapes matching & tracing sheets from Little Smarty Ants
- Velcro calendar and clock sheets, also from Little Smarty Ants
- This American sign language alphabet printable
Now for the fun part! How often you rotate is totally up to you – I like to rotate ours weekly and throw in some toys or small activities that haven’t been played with in a while.
MORNING BASKET ACTIVITIES
- Puzzles! Here is a link to our favorites
- DIY activity with these dot stickers
- Playdoh or kinetic sand
- Reusable sticker pad (we have one with animals and dress-up)
- This bee game
- Lacing toy
- Balance rocks
- Magnatiles or these magnetic blocks
- Dress-up doll game
- Wooden instruments
- Princess matching card game
- Simple craft kits – we have found these at Hobby Lobby, Michael’s, Target or dollar stores!
- Magic ink or water wow books
- Paint with water books
- Drawing board
- I keep this abacus handy for math practice
- Animal figurines
- Mini etch a sketch
I also like to include a few coloring pages with markers, crayons or colored pencils, along with fun stickers or stamps for my creative girl. And BOOKS are another great addition! We read lots of books in our house, so I will sometimes even change them out daily.
I hope this post gave you some inspiration and ideas for your own morning basket! Of course, it will look different for every age, but this is what has been working for our family with littles (here’s a link to my blog post with our homeschool pre-k routine). Let me know what you keep in your morning basket!
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