Hi Friends! This last (near) year has been a wile crazy ride with the birth of my son! I haven’t been able to post a lot of content since having to juggle motherhood, work, and life in general but finally finding a groove and also starting to miss being creative….
I’ve learned a lot of things in the last year and have really honed down on my skills of finding free/inexpensive things to do with a young child. I have definitely noticed that it can be hard to find activities for babies under 2 so I wanted to share some ideas that we’ve found and similar options can be found in many other major cities.
Storytime
San Jose has over 20 public libraries and most, if not all have their own story time! Not sure how many libraries you may have where you live but most likely you have at least ONE! Majority of these libraries probably offer children’s story time at least once or more a week.
Story time has been a great escape for us especially on days when it can be hard to be outside (rainy or extremely hot days). San Jose is also extremely diverse so they have story time in different languages including Spanish, Vietnamese, and Japanese. One of our favorite story times is the infant story time which is catered to non-walkers. They even put a foam mat out for the bubs to crawl around and moms to mingle. Due to covid they are no longer putting toys out on the mat but one day they hope to start that program again.
San Jose Public Library Story Times
Wee Play and Learn Play Areas
The local libraries in San Jose all have a little play area, better known as the Wee Play and Learn Play Area(s). I’m always surprised how much my son finds the toys at the library so interesting even if we have the same or similar toy at home Kids are funny that way!
Play and Learn Boxes
Another great find at the public library are these themed activity boxes. Each box includes books and educational toys that are related to the theme of the activity box. We’ve done shapes, numbers, and dinosaurs so far! You can check them out just like you would a book. Not in San Jose? Head to your local library and ask a librarian if they have something similar!
Baby Gym Class
If there’s anything I could credit my son’s early walking to, it would be baby gym class. There are a couple of different franchise gyms and we go to ‘The Little Gym’. You can start your bub as early as 4 months and its such a great way for babies to get a ton of exercise and BONUS, mom’s get to socialize!
***Unlike the other activities above, gym class is not free.
Music & Movement
We love music and movement! Another SJ Library find but before we discovered the local libraries had a series we paid for private music classes. Although it wasn’t his favorite class on his weekly activities list I thought it was a good change of scenery for both of us! It also helped introduce my son to dancing with music in larger groups and not just with me in the living room while I clean lol….
<3 Happy Mommin