I wish I could sew, I wish I could knit, I wish I had a workshop in my garage to saw and bang and hammer toys for my little one! But I don’t need any of that to make these really easy toys for him. No sewing or sawing required.

Give baby a wooden stick or a scarf and they will think of ways to play all day long. And babies this small (Aditya is 6 months old) are fascinated by everything! I don’t know if I can call the toys I made for him toys, but I know that YOU can make them too. And all materials are right at your home!

I was inspired by Montessori mobiles to buy a large jingle bell – one of their sensory mobiles is a jingle on a string or a ribbon. See, here goes the first toy! And the idea for the second one was conceived simply because the jingle bells came in a pack of two:) So I was thinking what to do with the second one and noticed, how Aditya loves his fabric ball with a jingle inside. I took a wash cloth (because of the texture, but you can take a piece of flannel or cotton fabric, or any other, for that matter) and this particular one had a frog face on it, and I thought it would be fun if I positioned the face so that it looks like frog’s head.

I put the jingle inside the cloth, tied with a ribbon and tadaa! This is a great tip for traveling too, if your baby gets tired of the old toys (or you forget to take any with you). The cloth is good enough as a makeshift doll without the bell inside.

There are many ways to play with these toys, but please be very careful, especially with the jingle on a string, as it may pose a strangling risk. Always make sure that the end is tied in a way your baby can’t get the string around his or her neck and supervise their discovery time with the toy!

I like using the jingle bell on this IKEA wooden gym – I just strip the hanging toys it comes with and tie the jingle for a change. It seems very simple, but Aditya just loves to bat, bat, bat at it!

This is what it looks like:

What simple toys do you make for your kids? Do you prefer making at least some toys or other items for your child to just buying everything?