Tuff Tray Accessories: My Top Picks

If you are a parent or carer of a young child, you are probably familiar with tuff trays (otherwise known as tuff spots). I have written before about how I personally prefer a smaller, inflatable play tray as an alternative but they both serve essentially the same purpose. To get you started, here are some of the tuff tray accessories I have purchased to help enable sensory and imaginative play:

A great place to start is with some bottles of food colouring. You can use these to dye pasta, rice or even sand, or to colour water. One of our favourite activities is to dye small amounts of sands different colours then we have fun laying them in a see through cup to make a rainbow.

You will have hours of fun with sand – you can use jelly moulds to make sandcastles, or bury hidden objects, or get out some pirate figurines and set up an imaginary beach and bury some treasure and really get their imagination flowing.

Another one of the best tuff tray accessories that I’d recommend is some artificial turf. This sample is a bargain and can be used to create a field or a farm. Or even get some figurines out for a game of football!

Artificial snow is also great fun for seasonal play – we have fun ploughing the snow and also having ‘snowfights’ with our Playmobil characters.

I love these Autumn leaves, they are great for Autumn play ideas. Why not collect some pinecones and conkers and hide them in the leaves and get the kids to find them and sort them into piles?

These beads (which start off tiny but expand when put into water) and delightfully squishy and make for a great sensory play activity. Just make sure you keep an eye on younger children as they are not to be eaten! They are also great for practicing those fine motor skills as well as learning colours.

This ice cream cone and scoop set is fab for using with sand or beads and making pretend ice creams.

These rail and road washi tapes are great fun and super easy – all you need to do is make a road/rail network, get out the toy trains and cars and watch your child have loads of fun.

These sea animals are brilliant and make for a really easy activity. Simple fill your tray with water (maybe add a splash of blue food colouring), pop in the animals and voila – a fun activity for the kids and hopefully a few minutes for you to grab a cup of tea in peace.

I think this tool set is an absolute essential for tuff tray play. The tools are fabulous for fine motor skill development.

Let me know if you have any more recommendations for other tuff tray accessories!