{"id":2985,"date":"2011-07-08T13:06:02","date_gmt":"2011-07-08T17:06:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.sarahsthreads.com\/journal\/?p=2985"},"modified":"2011-07-08T13:06:02","modified_gmt":"2011-07-08T17:06:02","slug":"beans-and-bags","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.sarahsthreads.com\/journal\/2011\/07\/beans-and-bags\/","title":{"rendered":"Beans and Bags"},"content":{"rendered":"

Our last “Red, White & Blue week” activity had two purposes.\u00a0 The goal was to wind up with some homemade bean bags to use for an activity during Anna’s birthday party.\u00a0 But as long as I was opening up some bags of dried navy beans, I thought we’d try the “sensory box” idea I’ve spotted on various sites.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
There are little toys hiding in the beans!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

So, a box.\u00a0 (Or in this case, a toy bin that I emptied for the purpose.\u00a0 I’d consider getting a dedicated box with a lid for this if I do this activity again, but it turned out a little messier than planned and involved a few bickering sessions between the girls, so…I don’t know.)\u00a0 You fill it with beans, and then hide a bunch of little objects in there.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Scooping and digging for buried treasures.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"\"<\/a>
Look! Little frogs and lizards!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

I put the filled box on top of a cookie sheet, handed them some measuring cups, and let them do their own thing.\u00a0 There was a lot of scooping, more spilling than I expected, a fair number of arguments over who could hold the little toys they found, and still a fair amount of time-consuming fun.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Lots of little random goodies.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Then I got out the fabric.\u00a0 This bit was mostly me with kids observing, although Carolyn did help with the parts that didn’t involve sharp blades or sewing machines.\u00a0 I like to make double-layer bean bags, as follows:<\/p>\n

For each bag, cut two 4″ squares of muslin.\u00a0 Place squares wrong sides together.\u00a0 Sew three sides with a 1\/4″ seam.\u00a0 Fill with 1\/3 – 1\/2 cup of beans (depending on how firm you want the bags) and sew the final side.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Squares all cut and ready to sew.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Cut two 4 1\/2″ squares of the outer fabric.\u00a0 Place squares right sides together.\u00a0 Sew around with a 1\/4″ seam, leaving the center 3″ on one side open for turning and stuffing.\u00a0 Turn right side out and poke corners out as best you can – clipping the corners diagonally will help with this.\u00a0 If you are not lazy, at this point, you could press the squares.\u00a0 I don’t.<\/em><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Outer square ready to turn.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Stuff the inner square with the beans into the outer square.\u00a0 Fold the open edges in 1\/4″, then top-stitch around the square about 1\/8″ from the edge, being sure to close that open edge completely.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Finished bean bags.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Commence juggling!\u00a0 Or bean bag tossing.\u00a0 Or whatever it is you can think to do with bean bags…as long as it doesn’t involve lobbing it at your sister’s head and causing her to scream with all the drama one would expect out of someone who had been hit with a brick instead of a bag of beans.\u00a0 Sigh.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Our last “Red, White & Blue week” activity had two purposes.\u00a0 The goal was to wind up with some homemade bean bags to use for an activity during Anna’s birthday party.\u00a0 But as long as I was opening up some<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[38,60],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2985","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sewing","category-summer-fun"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sarahsthreads.com\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2985","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sarahsthreads.com\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sarahsthreads.com\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sarahsthreads.com\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sarahsthreads.com\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2985"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.sarahsthreads.com\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2985\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2995,"href":"https:\/\/www.sarahsthreads.com\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2985\/revisions\/2995"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sarahsthreads.com\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2985"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sarahsthreads.com\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2985"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sarahsthreads.com\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2985"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}