Beach Theme Sensory Table

With summer quickly approaching I'm thinking of all things summer so I put together a beach theme sensory table.  For the sand I used brown rice (had no sand on hand and the rice is an easier clean up anyway!)

Here's what I included in our beach theme sensory bin which was all purchased from the dollar store:
Bag of shells
Bag of small stones
Gems
Flamingos
Summer Cups
Shot Cups
Cocktail Umbrella's

I used our water table to set this up and it always works out great!  On the other side of the water table I put in some water and added in blue food coloring.  For the water section I threw in some plastic alligators and some other sea creatures like turtles, dolphins, fish, etc.

After putting in the rice I laid out the shells and added the gems so that Tiffany could bury and find hidden treasure!  I really liked the cocktail umbrella's as it added a cute touch to the beach theme.

Tiffany first played with the shells and the rice but quickly became interested in the water.  She gave the alligator a shell to 'sun bathe' on and it was at this point that I gave her some other sea animals.  Tiffany also enjoyed taking the stones from the beach area and putting them into the water.  The umbrella's also made their way down to the water and animals.  The large summer cups were great for pouring and filling with the stones and shells.  It's always interesting to me to see what will grab my daughter's attention.  No doubt it was the water!  She stayed with this activity for an hour and toward the end she went back to the 'sand' side and hid the gems and asked me to find them.  After that Tiffany used the little plastic shot cups and started sorting the gems by color!

I think it's safe to say that this sensory play was a favorite!  

Do you have a favorite sensory bin?  I would love for you to share in the comments below or on our facebook page