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1. A Mess-Free Way To Eat Ice Cream
It’s not fun having to clean up after your kids when they eat a popsicle and it drips all over their hands and clothes, or even your sofa and carpet. Here’s an easy trick to prevent unwanted drips and stains:
1. Make a small hole in the centre of a cupcake liner.
2. Slip the ice-cream stick through the hole before handing it to your child.
3. The cupcake liner prevents the ice cream from dripping all over your child’s fingers.
Tip: If the cupcake liner is not sturdy enough, use more than one. You can also use a disposable lid.
2. A Mess-Free Way To Do Finger-Painting
Kids love squishing paint with their fingers, but the mess it creates can give you a headache. Here’s a simple way to let children finger-paint without them getting the walls dirty and having to wash paint out of their hair:
1. Squirt blobs of paint into a resealable plastic bag and seal it.
2. Tape the bag flat onto the top of a table.
3. The child can rub on the paint and mix colours without getting his or her hands dirty.
Tips:
• Place a piece of white paper under the bag so that the paints show up better or squirt paint on a piece of paper and insert it into the plastic bag.
• Use paints that are not too thick and which spread easily.
3. Create Endless Entertainment In Minutes
Letting babies and toddlers play with colourful sensory bottles can help stimulate their senses. These fun bottles can be made using recycled and everyday materials from around the house:
1. Fill a small bottle with olive oil, or glue and warm water.
2. Add some glitter, colour dye or even a small toy.
3. Tighten the bottle cap or lid.
Tips:
• If you do not have glue or olive oil, add some leaves, sparkly materials or any small eye-catching objects into a bottle of water.
• Check regularly to ensure that the bottle caps and lids are screwed on tightly.
4. Help Your Child Wear Shoes Correctly
Getting young children to put on shoes independently can be tough. While they may know how to slip their feet into shoes, they may need help differentiating the right shoe from the left one. Here’s a trick to help them out:
1. Cut a sticker into half and place the left half on the inside of the left shoe and do the same for the right half.
2. When the pair of shoes are put side by side, the sticker will look almost whole when it meets in the middle and seeing this will help the child tell the right shoe from the left.
Tip: Use a sticker that sticks well on the insole and let your child have a say in what sticker to use.
5. No More Wasted Soap
Many toddlers love playing with water during bath time. And they also love playing with the soap dispenser, which means your soap can run out pretty quickly. If you can’t stop your kid from getting his or her hands on the bottle, then do this to minimise the wastage:
Wrap a rubber band several times around the dispenser’s pump stem (pictured) to limit the amount of liquid soap that is dispensed.
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Text: Lea Wee, The Straits Times
Photos: Ng Sor Luan
