Little babies need soft, cuddly toys to hold onto and play with. And, one of the first things that a growing baby can do to improve their motor skills is stacking things and building. Soft building block toys are the perfect things for babies and young children to play with.
The building block toys need to stand up when stacked, keep their shape, and be colorful, fun and safe for your baby. The best way to fulfill all of these needs is to make the blocks yourself.
Materials for Soft Building Block Toys
You only need three simple materials to construct soft building block toys: pieces of sturdy but squishy foam, felt fabric, and strong thread or embroidery floss. You will also need a scissor to cut the felt and a needle to sew them together.
Construct the Building Block Toys
These simple to make baby toys can be completed very quickly. The first step is to cut the foam into the shapes that you want. If you purchase the foam used to make furniture cushions, you only need to cut it into square and rectangle shapes with a sharp scissor or smooth knife. You can also make triangles, circles, and other shapes as well.
After you cut out the pieces of foam, cut the felt fabric to cover all sides of the blocks. Allow a narrow stitching allowance on all edges. These building blocks come out better if you cut a piece of felt for each side rather than wrap the foam block.
Then, simple stitch the edges together with your stout thread or embroidery floss. You can have the seams turned to the inside for neat blocks, or keep it on the outside to give your baby something extra to feel and grab.
More Ideas for Building Block Toys
It is very quick and easy to construct a simple set of soft building block toys for baby. However, if you wish to make the blocks more exciting and educational, you can appliqué letters, numbers, shapes, or patterns onto the felt pieces before stitching them around the block. You can use a wide variety of different colors and even use contrasting stitching for a more exciting look.
Instead of making a basic set of cubes, rectangles, and triangles, you can make soft building blocks that are decorated as parts of buildings complete with windows and doors stitched on.
For added interest for your baby, you can tuck a jingle bell or rattle safely in the center of the foam blocks, stitch ribbon or tag loops around the edge of the blocks, or sew Velcro patches to the sides so that the soft building blocks can be stitched together.
Creating hand-made building block toys for your baby will provide them with a fun and educational toy that they will love. For older babies and toddlers, you can increase the educational aspect with letters, numbers, colors, and shapes. Stackable, squeezable, colorful, and sturdy, any baby will love to play with these soft building block toys generation after generation.
