How to Make a Babysitting Kit

Babysitting can be fun and a good way to earn a little extra cash. To help keep the children happily playing while you are there and to help increase your chances of being asked to babysit again because the children adore you, take along a babysitting kit to your next job. A babysitting kit is packed with toys, games, and art supplies and help keep the children entertained.

Difficulty: Moderately Easy

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

• An assortment of toys, games, art supplies, videos, etc.
• A fun bag or box to store and carry the items in

1. Before your next babysitting job stop by the dollar store and pick up some fun stickers, new crayons, coloring books, and other arts and craft supplies to take with you. For $5 to $10 you can buy enough supplies to keep the children occupied for a while and still have enough leftover for future babysitting jobs.

2. Pack some scrap paper. Children can use it for drawing on, putting stickers on, making paper airplanes, and all sort of things.

3. Use your computer and printer and print off some free coloring pages, word searches, and activity pages. Printable pages can be found on places like nickjr.com/printables and dltk-kids.com as well as several other places.

4. Collect a few of your favorite books from your childhood and bring them along with you to read to your babysitting charges. Check thrift stores, library sales, garage sales, and used bookstores for inexpensive sources of children's books.

5. Children love to play games! Bring a couple of board games that are suitable for children or families and a deck of cards. Classics like Candy Land and Chutes and Ladders are wonderful for pre-school aged children and older children will enjoy games like Sorry, Trouble, and Guess Who. A deck of playing cards can turn into a game of "Go Fish" or "War". If you don't already have games of your own that you can bring to share check a thrift store or garage sales. A deck of cards can be found at a drug store or dollar store.

6. Do you have any toys from your childhood that you've kept and don't mind sharing? Children love to see and play with toys they've never seen before. Stuffed toys, dolls, action figures, cars and trucks are all ideas of what you can take with you. Or check for gently used toys at garage sales, thrift stores, Freecycle, and Craigslist.

7. If the children are allowed to watch television while you are there and they have a VCR or DVD player you can borrow children's movies from the library for them to watch. Make sure to run this by the parents first and make sure they approve of the movie.

8. Pick a fun container, bag, or box to pack up your items to take with you. Maybe you'll even want to have the children help you decorate the kit with the arts and crafts supplies you've brought. Now your babysitting kit is finished.

Tips & Warnings

• Do not spend much money on your babysitting kit in case some of the items get broken or lost.
• Put away a dollar or two of your babysitting money each time towards buying new things to replenish your babysitting kit.
• Ask the children for suggestions on what they'd like to see in your babysitting kit.
• If you are sitting for multiple children make sure there is enough for everyone to share and bring duplicates of some items if you can.
• Make sure the items you pack in your kit are age appropriate for the children you are babysitting.
• Check everything you pack to make sure it is in good condition and there are no small pieces or sharp edges the children can get hurt on.
• Make sure none of the items you take have been recalled. You can check cpsc.gov for lists of recalled items.
• Supervise the children with the babysitting kit and make sure they know what rules, if any, you have surrounding the kit. This will keep it fun for everyone.

[graciegirl11]

on 8/19/2009 HELPFUL, LOTS OF GOOD IDEAS

[FrogDoc]

on 2/24/2009 Great suggestions! I need to forward this to my babysitter! :)