To not want to do messy play with my 10 month old?

[Saladleaf]

At the moment am a SAHM to my 10 month old. I keep seeing online about messy play, and obviously when they go to nursery it seems like they do messy play with them.

I spend half my life cleaning the floor and high chair already and don’t feel like he would really gain anything additional from me doing messy play with him than what he already gets from meals and bath time? We do BLW.

Is it unreasonable that I really don’t want the additional mess and cleaning up to do? When did people start doing these types of activity at home (also baking, art etc) if baby didn’t go to nursery? He’ll be going in the new year and id be more than happy to let them do it (and the clearing up..!)

when he’s at home he plays with his toys, we have lots, we read and we look out of the window etc. he does independent play and we go on walks on days when we don’t go to baby groups. Now he’s crawling and more interactive I just feel like I should be doing a more structured day with him? AIBU?

It doesn’t have to be much or too messy. Do you have outside space? Some of my favourite memories are making coloured cooked spag and coloured rice and homemade playdoh for my kids to play with. If you do it outside/on a large mat the clean up is pretty simple. Messy play doesn’t mean you have to trash your house.

Of course you don't have to do messy play. You're not an employee with required tasks, you're a parent, you get to decide what happens.

I hated it - rarely did it at home. Thankfully they started full time nursery at six months where messy play was a regular event

My eldest DC detested messy play and we never did it at home (used playdough sometimes but probably not at 10 months). Was a local playgroup that ran sessions so I would go along to those every now and then especially once DC2 came along who was far more into it. So no, no need to do at home

No need. If you're not inclined that's okay. They will do it at nursery.

Wrt general mess, my top tip from the olden days is to sit the highchair on a sheet or two of newspaper (do you get a free weekly local rag full of ads and local announcements? Perfect!) At the end of each day move the high chair, roll up the newspaper sheet/s with all the gubbins contained within, dispose of, replace, repeat.

What sort of messy play? Isn't a 10 month old a bit little for painting/playdoh etc? We did have lots of bath toys and mine loved splashing about in there for ages, supervised obviously! But I don't think they did any specifically messy play at that age 🤔

Sorry but yes you are. Looking back, I don’t regret a minute playing with our kids. I do regret wasting far too much time on fairly pointless housework.

Have you got a garden? I won't do messy play in my flat but I do let him at it in the garden.

messy play is part of children learning to manage different textures.

As long as his life isn’t sterile and he’s allowed sit/crawl on different surfaces and explore the world around him you don’t need to set up specific tasks.

Although my life hack is if you have a bath with overhead shower painting and shaving foam play are great be done done in there and then child and bath showered afterwards 😂

Children need a variety of sensory experiences, movement and purposeful activity but there are different ways of achieving that goal.

I hated messy play- I took my children to the local sure start centre when they existed and remember plonking them in trays of baked beans, cooked spagetti, shaving foam etc. I was always so relived to wash them off and put clothes back on again!
Once my son grew to toddler age he actively avoided anything messy- the mud kitchen, painting etc- but it turns out he is ND
He can't stand getting dirty at all now.

I didn’t do any painting/ baking etc at 10 months.
At 12 months I started felt-tips.
13 months painting and corn flour.
15 months play doh (mine just tried to eat it before then)
18 months baking when they started to be able to follow an instruction and not just throw flour everywhere.

Painting in the shower/ bath is the best, fully agree with PP!

It’s important to ensure your child gets used to a range of different textures and sensations but it doesn’t have to be particularly messy. Shaving foam on a tray in the highchair, paint handprints etc can all be very easily contained. Obviously if you have a garden you can do more.

At 10 months it’s probably quite early to be doing much as it will mostly end up in their mouth but it honestly doesn’t have to be a huge mess.

I say this as a former developmental psychologist - messy play is in no way vital to a child's development and there will be no harm done whatsoever by not 'ensuring a child gets used to a range of textures.' It's true that a child that lives in a deprived situation with very little stimulus will suffer, but the average child going about their day, eating, crawling, playing with toys will 100% definitely get enough contact with the world to allow them to develop normally. It really pisses me off that some people have put the fear of god into parents (mainly mothers of course) making them believe that they have to do a song and dance and almost perform parenthood in a weird orchestrated way. As long as your child is participating in life, life will present plenty of opportunities to learn.

The only advice I would give is to chat to your child and read books with them. Language is a complex developmental process and does need plenty of boosts to get it going.

Touch and texture are everywhere, you don't need to artificially create them.

My one is 3 and I never did messy play. Sure she played in the garden and got muddy, but I never did all the things you see online like shaving foam or baked beans as it feels like a waste of food and money.

She has yet to do much painting and is happy with a bucket of water and a paintbrush outside. Hasn't got felt tips as all I see is kids drawing on things they shouldn't and is happy with crayons and chalk for outside. She loves playdoh but didn't have it until she was 2. Used to hate baking as she didn't like the noise from the mixer until recently.

Messy play doesn't have to be that messy - try calling it "sensory play" instead, and consider that it's a way of letting a baby explore different textures and the properties of different things, whether that's paint or sand or water or ooblek. Yes letting a baby smoosh shaving foam around will be messy. But playdoh can be contained to a high chair or table. You can have a full-on mud kitchen and let them get covered in the stuff, or you can have them help you plant a couple of seeds or pull up some weeds. You can let them put their hands and feet in paint and roll around in it, or help them to carefully do some fingerpainting.

As a teacher, I completely agree with AnPiscin.

But one thing I always like to share is that, when they are a little older give them a bucket of water and a range of paint brushes of different sizes.

They can paint outside to their heart's content and it dries with no mess to clean! It's also good for their gross and fine motor skills and helps develop the muscles they will need for writing from their shoulders down to their fingers.

The same goes for digging/scratching soil with a stick.

My first child hated messy play, and when he went to nursery (started part time around 10 months) refused to join in with it. He had no problem being messy at mealtimes (we also did BLW) but had no interest whatsoever in playdoh, painting, sand, etc. for a really long time, closer to 3. I was glad I had nursery to offer all that stuff as I wasn't going to be wasting time setting it up at home only for him to ignore it.

Shower curtains under the high chair are your friends here. Shake them off, Rinse, hang to dry and put back or replace for the next meal.

Messy or sensory play wasn't even a thing when mine were small. How did our kids survive.

If you don't get a newspaper then a shower curtain, tent groundsheet, or waterproof bedsheet also works. For dry mess a sheet or tablecloth works but paint/ink/juice can seep through.

Absolutely this.

Nobody did 'messy play' with kids until very recently. Sure, toddlers did things like painting and play-doh at nursery or whatever, but absolutely nobody of my generation was sitting their baby down to play with cooked spaghetti or whatever to 'get them used to textures', and we all seem to have grown up perfectly normally.

See also 'baby sensory'. Your baby gets a sensory experience literally every time you take them anywhere. If you want to lay them on the floor and let them watch coloured lights wafting about because they seem to enjoy it, that's lovely, but it's not necessary and it doesn't really do anything for their development.

Play dough isn't too bad to clean up and playing in the bath with bath toys is a sensory experience. Doesn't have to be paint and shaving foam.

It never even occurred to me to do messy play with DS. I know they did it at nursery but we never did it at home. We would sing, read books, go for walks, etc, but messy play? I don't think there's any need unless you're going to get enjoyment out of it yourself.

We didn't really do it much at home. We went to some organised sessions where someone else tidied up the room at the end. I couldn't face the tidy up.