Busy Bag Ideas for church & home
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Years ago, I attended a church that provided activity bags (or as some people call them, busy bags) for young children to use during service. Fast forward to now… as someone who is passionate about multi-generational worship and also the mother of a 2 year old, I decided to create activity bags for our church. My daughter does well staying in service with us (and I think it’s important for her to be there), but she is, after all, a just-barely 2 year old. Having some activities for her helps us all have a better church experience.
We also recently took a vacation to Florida, which included 15ish hours of driving each way. What a perfect time to prep and test out our new busy bags! I actually created some activity bags for us to keep at home and some activity bags to be used in our church busy bags.
This project entailed two parts: (1) creating small busy bags with various educational, faith-based and just plain fun (and quiet) activities for kids and (2) using said small busy bags inside larger activity bags for our church. These activities are all tailored toward toddler/preschool kids, but could easily be modified for kids of any age. Read about part 2, using the busy bags to create church busy bags, here.
I ordered the zipper pouches on Amazon. I actually ordered two sets (a clear set with various sized pouches and a colored set with all the same sized pouches). Although they’re from different Amazon sellers, the bags are the exact same type and quality. The activities inside the bags are from a variety of places – some we already had at home or church, some I purchased just for the busy bags and some we have purchased secondhand.
I originally labeled the church zipper pouches with our church name and a busy bag number using our label maker, but several of the labels came off during our travels. I ended up removing all the labels and just writing on the bags with permanent marker. If you’re using your busy bags in a ministry setting, I’d definitely suggest numbering them and making a list of the contents of each busy bag!
BUSY BAGS FOR HOME
| Items included | Approximate cost |
| Frozen matching game My 2 year old enjoyed playing with these, although I’ll admit I’m still finding the pieces in random places in the car! | $0 (We already had.) |
| Small bright plastic buttons | $0 (We already had.) |
| Small elastic hair bands | $1 |
| 2 small packs of glow sticks Road trip pro tip: keep glow sticks in the car. Always. They come in handy when you’re caught in a rainstorm or just bored in the car! | $2 |
| 22 brightly colored elastic hair ties | $1 |
| “Secrets of the Seashore” shine-a-light Usborne book; 2 click lights The shine-a-light series is great for all ages! This is definitely worth the money. | $14 |
| Melissa & Doug Water Wow books with paint brush My 2 year old LOVES the Water Wow books (and her early to middle elementary cousins all love them too!). | $4 per book (We had several of these on hand, but I bought one more.) |
| Melissa & Doug MagiColor book with markers We love the MagiColor books! | $4 |
| Kid’s books | $0 (We already had.) |
| Minnie Mouse sticker book, Imagine Ink coloring book & Imagine Ink painting set I would NOT purchase the Imagine Ink products again. They were messy and didn’t work as well as the MagiColor & Water Wow books. | $8 |
Total money spent on busy bags for home:
Including the bags themselves, I spent ~$40
to make the 10ish bags pictured and listed above.
BUSY BAGS FOR CHURCH
| Items included | Approximate cost |
| “Great Bible Stories” flash cards (set of 36) | $0 (donated by church member) |
| “Great Bible Heroes” flash cards (set of 36) | $0 (donated by church member) |
| 18 animal body part puzzle pieces | Under $1 |
| 2 laminated shapes with colored dots; 10 clothespins colored with Sharpies | Under $1 |
| 5 felt popsicles; 10 large colored craft sticks | Under $1 |
| 12 large colored craft sticks with velcro dots on both sides | Under $1 |
| 40 large plastic buttons | $0 (We already had.) |
| 26 laminated alphabet road letter cards; 4 Hotwheels cars I printed these in black and white on blue card stock paper. They look much more fun when printed in color, though. I may re-print. | $4 |
| 13 laminated blue alphabet cards; 1 double-sided dry erase marker | Under $1 |
| 3 laminated shapes with colored dots; 15 clothespins colored with Sharpies | Under $1 |
| Foam sheets (cut in half & labeled with numbers 1-6, then added that # of velcro dots); ~30 buttons with velcro dots | Under $1 (We had many of the parts on hand already.) |
| 10 wooden lacing blocks; 1 lacing cord | $1 (purchased from a secondhand store) |
| 9 wooden lacing blocks; 1 lacing cord | $1 (purchased from a secondhand store) |
| 9 foam puzzle pieces | $1 |
| 6 lacing cards; 2 lacing cords | $1 (purchased from a secondhand store) |
| 5 lacing cards; 2 lacing cords | $1 (purchased from a secondhand store) |
| 12 large colored craft sticks with velcro dots on both sides | Under $1 |
| Minnie Mouse playing cards | $1 |
| 10 plastic bugs; 2 plastic bug grabbers (chip clips) | $0 (Already had at church) |
| Whiteboard; 1 black dry erase marker; 1 eraser | $1.25 |
| Whiteboard; 1 black dry erase marker; 1 eraser | $1.25 |
| 2 laminated dry erase pages (Jesus loves me & alphabet with animals); 1 double-ended dry erase marker | Under $1 |
| 3 laminated dry erase pages (decorate a Christmas tree, decorate a pumpkin, nativity coloring); 1 double-ended dry erase marker | Under $1 |
| 3 laminated dry erase pages (2 shapes pages, alphabet sheet); 1 double-ended dry erase marker | Under $1 |
| 7 laminated dry erase pages (7 days of creation); 2 double-ended dry erase markers | Under $2 |
Total money spent on busy bags for church:
Including the bags themselves, I spent ~$40
to make the 25ish bags pictured and listed above.
I also have lots of extra supplies left over
(colored craft sticks, velcro dots, zipper bags, etc).
A few notes on church busy bags:
-Many of the items in our church busy bags were printed from the internet on card stock paper, then laminated. There was a nominal cost for paper, ink and laminating sheets, but we already had those items on hand (as well as the laminating machine – if you don’t have one of these, I’d strongly suggest getting one. I use it ALL THE TIME.).
-Several of the bags include dry erase activities and markers. I’m including these on a VERY trial run basis… dry erase markers and pew fabric may not mix well!
As you can tell from the money spent on home and church busy bags, these can be made on pretty much any budget! I was much more budget-conscious when making the church busy bags because I was using church funds, whereas our home bags I paid for out-of-pocket.
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