Now booking Class-size and multi-room orders · Many lines are made to order, so lead time runs about three to eight weeks from the date your purchase order reaches us, not from the date of your quote · If you are paying by card, we place your order with the makers on payment. Every quote states an arrival window for each line, and the few makers who run longer are flagged on your quote.
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Outfit Your Setting Your cart becomes your quote
A child stands ankle-deep in water inside a Gus + Mabel Busy Bee Tray outdoors, the water scattered with hibiscus, nasturtium, and pansy blossoms, pebbles, and floating coconut bowls. Soft late-afternoon side-light.

Nature Play & Inquiry

Loose Parts & Nature Inquiry

Felt acorns warm in the hand. Teak scoops, a coconut sieve, and a tray that holds water on Monday and dry seed pods by Friday round out the table. These are open-ended natural materials for Pre-K to Grade 3, made to be sorted, counted, and arranged with no fixed outcome.

Section 02  ·  Pre-K to Grade 3
For budget & procurement

Built for the NGSS science practices children do before they can write them down: observe, sort, count, and ask what changes. Every material maps to a practice on the alignment letter. Commonly funded through Title IV-A and local science lines, or outdoor-education grants. Final eligibility is determined by your school, district, or organization.

NGSS · Science Practices Request an alignment letter Ages 3+ · Pre-K to Grade 3 Hand-felted wool · Kathmandu SVLK teak · Indonesia Doussie · Vietnam Net 60 · exemption certificates

Hand-felted in the Kathmandu valley, hand-finished in teak workshops. Slow goods, on purpose.

The felt loose parts are hand-felted from wool in the Kathmandu valley workshops. The teak nature tools are hand-finished from SVLK teak in Indonesia.

A child in a soft sweater leans over a Gus + Mabel Busy Bee Tray, placing dried citrus slices among teak scoops, dried herbs, and pressed everlasting flowers.
What Nature Play Is

Open-ended materials. Real, child-led inquiry.

Set out a handful of acorns, a tray of water, and a few seed pods, and a morning organizes itself. Children sort, pour, count, and ask what changed, the first science practices, long before they can write them down. Nothing here lights up or hands a child a script. There are no batteries. There are no instructions. The materials are the instructions.

Loose-Parts Play

Sorting, counting, transferring, arranging, no fixed outcome.

Practical Life

Scooping, pouring, pincer grip, the slow rhythm of the work.

Outdoor Learning

From garden to nature table to mud kitchen and back.

NGSS · K-2

Life science, classification, place-based observation.

In this section

Open-ended natural materials for sorting, counting, and seasonal arranging.

Featured
Collections
Sets
A child's face is mirrored in the Gus + Mabel Busy Bee Tray fitted with the Reflective Play Mirror Inlay, surrounded by hibiscus, marigold, morning glory, and sunflower blossoms collected outdoors. [ HERO PRODUCT  ·  BUSY BEE TRAY ]
Gus + Mabel  ·  Featured

Busy Bee Tray.

Three insert configurations, two add-on inlays. One tray, a term's worth of open-ended play.

Fill it with water on Monday and float petals and pebbles. Swap in the Sixth Insert on Friday and it becomes six sorting wells for acorns, seed pods, and dried citrus. The embossed Australian flora and fauna base invites tracing and rubbing, and the Reflective Mirror inlay scaffolds symmetry study and self-recognition. The waterproof eco-composite moves between the outdoor classroom, the nature table, and a small-group water station.

Material Bamboo fiber composite
Origin China
Ages 3+
Learning connections
Small Group, 2 to 4 Natural Sciences Early Classification Outdoor Learning Montessori · Practical Life

From $165

Build your tray →
01 Nature Tools · Papoose
A note on the table

The tools are half the table.

Scoops, sieves, carved bowls, the whole set: they are only half the work. What fills them comes next. Felt acorns and pinecones, carved woodland leaves and bird eggs, gathered loose for sorting, counting, and seasonal arranging. Set the tools out beside a tray of loose parts, and the nature table starts writing its own lesson.

02 Nature Loose Parts · Tara Treasures & Papoose

Paying for this

One room or a whole school, many ways to pay for it.

Districts issue a purchase order and are invoiced Net 60. Private practices, microschools, libraries, and homeschool co-ops pay by card, or we invoice you directly, with no purchase order needed. We give you the paperwork either way.

Open an educator accountHow schools fund this
Lead time
3 to 8 weeks from PO
Arrival window
Stated per line on your quote
Quote turnaround
2 business days, held 45 days
Terms
Card, invoice, or Net 60 for approved districts

The whole nature table

Outfit your setting in one quote.

Each set is priced at the sum of its parts. What you are buying is fewer lines on the requisition.

Schools buy Nature Play as catalog sets, not single pieces, so here is the whole section, combined into one.

CATALOG SETS  ·  ONE-ON-ONE CURATION  ·  SINGLE PURCHASE ORDER

Nature Tools  ·  MTW-NPI-NTS

The Nature Tools Set.

The full Papoose teak tool kit.

Hand-finished teak, gathered for the loose-parts station, sand table, and mud kitchen. From the 2026 Fall Edition, p. 16.

  • Baby Nesting Bowls, MTW-NPI-BNB
  • Tongs, MTW-NPI-TNG
  • Spoon Set, MTW-NPI-SPS
  • Coconut Sieve, MTW-NPI-MCS
  • Slotted Spoon, MTW-NPI-PSS

WARNING: CHOKING HAZARD. Small parts. Not for children under 3 yrs.

Included in The Whole Nature Table (MTW-NPI-WNT). Ordering both duplicates these items.

View full details →

Nature Loose Parts  ·  MTW-NPI-AUT

Nature Loose Parts Set.

The carved wood and hand-felted loose parts together.

Gathered for sorting, counting, and seasonal arranging. From the 2026 Fall Edition, p. 15.

  • Woodland Leaves · 40 pieces, MTW-NPI-MNL
  • Mushrooms in a Basket · 15 pieces, MTW-NPI-MNM
  • Bird Eggs in a Basket · 12 pieces, MTW-NPI-MNE
  • Natural Sorting Discs · 12 pieces, MTW-NPI-DSN-12
  • Natural Graduated Columns · set of 4, MTW-NPI-STU
  • Autumn Leaves · 4 pieces, MTW-NPI-LVS
  • Pinecones · 3 pieces, MTW-NPI-PNC
  • Mushrooms · Red and Brown · 10 pieces, MTW-NPI-MSH
  • Acorns · Orange and Green · 10 pieces, MTW-NPI-ACN
  • Counting Blueberries · 48 pieces, MTW-NPI-BLU

WARNING: CHOKING HAZARD. Small parts. Not for children under 3 yrs.

Included in The Whole Nature Table (MTW-NPI-WNT). Ordering both duplicates these items.

View full details →

Hand-felted and hand-finished pieces are made to order, so each line ships in its own arrival tranche. Your quote states the window for every line.

Net 60 · exemption certificates
A note from us

Or tell us about your setting.

For custom mixes, district orders, or just a consultation, write to us directly. We are Irfana and Rashid, the founders, and a small team in Los Angeles. We will reply with a set recommendation, a line-item quote, and an estimated ship date.

Most accounts hear back within two business days.

Replied to by a human.

Every reply comes from Irfana, Rashid, or a member of our small team. Never a bot, never a ticket queue. Within two business days.

Or schedule a call.

For first-time school accounts, district planning, or a walkthrough of the catalog. Twenty minutes on the phone with someone who knows the makers.

Call us: (626) 841-0421 →
Or call us direct · (626) 841-0421 · Mon to Fri, 9am to 5pm Pacific

Tell us about the room and we will build the quote. The full form, with budget, timeline, and the sets you are considering, is on our quote page.

Request an educator quote

Or write to educators@mytoywagon.com or call (626) 841-0421, Monday to Friday, 9am to 5pm Pacific.

From the Educator Catalog

Educator reviews, how orders work, and the Educator Letter all live on the catalog landing, once for every volume.

Visit the Educator Catalog →