Creative and fun make your own Yoto card ideas

If you read my blog post here, you know I’m a big fan of Yoto Player. I’ve compiled a list of ideas for those custom Make Your Own Yoto cards. They can either be designed for our child to enjoy, to support guided or independent learning, or for the whole family to listen together.

Yoto is a valuable addition to our trilingual family. It’s important for both my husband and I to expose our son to our respective countries’ cultures, languages, music, influences, and traditions, and this little device has been very helpful in that regard.

One of the biggest advantages of this super fun no-screen audio player for babies and kids is that it has a very open ecosystem. What do I mean by that?

Why Yoto?

The Make Your Own cards, which allow us to create custom playlists and recordings, come in inexpensive packs of 10 for $24.99, which comes down to $2.50 per card. The setup card that comes with a brand new Yoto can be turned into MYO as well.

You can store up to 100 tracks/500MB of audio content on each Make Your Own Card, and edit them as many times as you like. This is a lot of storage, as I find it hard to imagine I would put a 100 recordings for my child to flip through, but it’s good to not worry about space when creating a card.

Additionally, MYO cards can be used to replace the lost card content from a previously purchased original card, which is neat.

In my previous post, I did a quick math, which tells me that $1 gives me 200MB with MYO Yoto cards and only 9 – 18MB using Creative Tonie (the biggest Yoto competitor). It’s a big difference.

Yoto users grew a large online DIY community of parents (like the one on Reddit) with hundreds of resources and inspirations available. I mean, that’s pretty cool!

Custom content aside, the original Yoto library is extensive and affordable, with many different recording types available. It is easy to find something valuable for our child between music, storytime, relaxation, and educational content Yoto offers. And I love that they don’t push the branded, licensed cards as their primary selling point.

yoto make your own card ideas

1. Our culture’s major holiday traditional music, like Christmas carols.

While we’re not very religious as a family, growing up in a Christian culture, with its holidays, values, and traditions, impacted our lives significantly. For some reason, Christmas music is not a very big thing in my husband’s (predominantly Christian) country, but the Christmas carols called “koledy” are a huge part of the holiday season in Poland. It’s something we sing decorating the tree with baubles, cooking the traditional dishes, and then together with a family after the main event, which is Christmas Eve.

What I always loved about the carols is that even though we’re a fairly reserved nation on a day-to-day, it unifies us all on that special night. It doesn’t matter if you can sing, if you know all the lyrics, or just the chorus. Everyone, young and old, feels comfortable enough to join in. I used to take it for granted, but now, as I’m far away from my family, I’d like to gift my son a piece of that tradition as well.

He absolutely loved the Yoto MYO I made for him with my favorite carols this year, and it was part of why this holiday season felt so special. My family overseas was delighted to hear him sing the Polish version of “The Silent Night” in his toddler-y way.

Lulajze, Jezuniu (Lullaby Jesus) is one of my favorite Christmas carols.

2. Halloween cute & (not too) spooky music

A parent-curated Halloween playlist with some fun, a little spooky but not scary, can be a fun way to introduce a child to the concept of Halloween and let the child familiarize themselves and get used to the upcoming event, especially if we’re planning to go trick-or-treating together. Help them get hyped up about it. We can play it as we prepare our costumes, do the makeup, or even enjoy the candy.

3. Love music for valentines

This one goes without saying, as love is the most popular song subject ever, but it’s worth remembering Valentine’s can be not only about romantic love but love in general. We can use it to help us explain the concept of love to our child, as music can cause a visceral response in our bodies, even the little ones. Basically, it can help evoke what the words sometimes can’t. My son absolutely loves Landslide by Fleetwood Mac.

4. Magic!

Who doesn’t love magic? While Montessori parents might frown, I think it’s just such a beautiful concept. Magic can relate not only to fantastical things but also to finding magic in everyday life. There are plenty of things that are enchanting without being magical, like the moon, stars, aurora borealis, rainbows, misty forests, old cobblestone streets, sunsets, old gardens, and old fountains…

I’m thinking pieces like Paquita Variation 5: Allegro non troppo, Camille Saint-Saëns – Aquarium, Debussy: Prélude à l’après-midi d’un faune or Prologue from Harry Potter movie’s score.

5. Happy!

You know those songs that instantly put the smile on your face and brighten your day? And I don’t like to suggest any songs, because I feel it’s very subjective. My little inner gremlin always grumps at songs that are trying to be happy way too hard, like “Don’t worry be happy” or Pharell’s “Happy”. I’m more of a smiling at “Where you lead I will follow” by Carol King kind of girl. I always need just a drop of sadness (or rather nostalgia?) in my bucket of happy.

6. Songs for cooking

When I think of a cooking playlist, something classic like Bruce Springstreen’s Hungry Heart comes to mind. It’s a little groovy, but not too groovy. We don’t want our kid to dance hard and fall off that toddler tower.

7. Songs for cleaning

Whatever gets the job done. For me, it’s usually Taylor Swift. I really like singing while cleaning. It’s the only way I can get through it.

8. Explore cultures from around the world

Custom Yoto MYO cards can be a fantastic way to introduce our child to different cultures and languages. Beautiful Japanese, Chinese, French, Italian, African, Brazilian, Korean, you name it. These playlists can accompany fun activities, such as using globes or maps to “travel” the world, playing with animal figurines from distinctive regions, trying new cuisines together as a family, etc.

9. Mom & dad’s favorite (child-friendly) songs

I know in the era of music on demand, it’s really hard to come up with our all-time favorite songs, but I think it’s an adorable way to introduce our child to the piece of us, to our past, that they haven’t yet met. We can listen to the songs that remind us of our college years, our first adult travels, and any music that holds special memories for us, like a song we used to sing to them or listen to during pregnancy before they were born.

Arcade Fire’s Modern Man is one of my all time favorites.

10. Italian summer & gelato

My 2-year-old is obsessed with ice cream (no surprise here), and he has a few ice cream toys and a coffee machine already. Recently, I DIY-ed a bit and turned the back of his Ikea play kitchen into a gelato cart. Together, we drew a “menu” for his new ice cream cart, and I’m creating an Italian summer-inspired playlist. I find it hilarious when my son keeps asking for “Ma ma Maria ma”. It’s super fun, endless hours of play.

11. Brazilian classics (Samba & Bossa nova)

Since my husband is Brazilian, I’ve heard a lot of different Brazilian music over the years. While I’m not a fan of the newer genres like funk, the never-aging classics like Bossa nova or Samba are hard to beat. If you haven’t heard about Bossa nova, I’m sure you actually heard Bossa nova, as it is a soundtrack of pretty much any nicer restaurant.

As such, we can use it to play pretend for toy dinner parties and picnics. Or we can have a pretend day at the beach, with a setup of towels, an umbrella, homemade yogurt popsicles, kinetic sand, and sand toys in our living room/playroom on a cold, rainy day.

If you want to start somewhere, there is nothing more classic than Garota De Ipanema (The Girl from Ipanema) by Tom Jobim.

12. Our childhood jams

Music for children is a big part of growing up and learning in any culture. To this day, I remember a lot of those songs. And sure, some of them (or rather their lyrics) didn’t age gracefully, but It made me (and my mom) really happy to see my son enjoying and dancing to the same songs I did when I was little.

13. Our NATIVE countrY’S classics

I’ve compiled a playlist of some of my favorite (adult) songs from my country. Some of them are favorites of my mom or my grandpa, who passed away before I met my husband. I used the moment of listening to that song to tell my son about him for the first time. Seeing my son enjoying classics from the ’50s, ’60s, and ’80s, as well as contemporary music, made my heart full.

My husband did a smiliar MYO with Brazilian music. There’s no way to describe the joy my toddler’s dancing to Lambada brought our family. These have been my son’s favorite Make Your Own Yoto cards for sure.

It’s a great, if nostalgic, song, but not exactly a child-friendly video.

14. 90’s-2000s pop

As a ’90s baby, the 2000s were the time of discovery of more “adult” music for me. I started making little mix tapes while listening to the radio for hours. This was when I realized I loved this thing called “music,” and there was much more to it than “Smurf hits” could offer.

I tried to be a little rebel and listen to Indie rock, but I didn’t shy away from Britney Spears either, as lip-syncing to her songs was a main event at every birthday party I attended. Since the aughts are now in revival (and I don’t care about seeming cool to anyone), I can enjoy Backstreet Boys with my son guilt-free.

15. The ’20s, ’50s, ’60s, ’80s music

All of the decades have a unique history, and the music reflected that. MYO can be made as a journey through time, showing how music genres evolved or by separate decades each. We can play dress up to those themes too or throw up little parties. There are many fun opportunities.

I was around 12 when I discovered The Shirelles, and that made me fall in love with music from the ’60s.

16. Favorite lullabies

I know there are many ready-to-purchase cards with the most popular lullabies, but compiling a playlist of the ones we hold dear is such a wholesome gift to our child. If we are not an English or French-speaking family(as I could only find music for sleep Yoto cards in these languages), this one is a must.

17. Dance party

Songs that wherever you are, whatever you’re doing, once they start playing, you can’t keep yourself from moving your body? Gloria by Laura Branigan always gets me. Dancing together with our child is just such a beautiful gift. We’re moving, having fun, teaching them new ways of enjoying their body and music and making happy memories. Need some inspiration for dance moves? This video will always be one of my forever favorites.

18. Family members recording birthday wishes

A gift to our children that they can cherish forever. Something they can always play when they want to feel a bit more special or connected to their family, even if the birthday has passed. Sometimes, on the day of the big birthday, things might get hectic, the child might get overwhelmed, and not everyone might get an opportunity to express their feelings properly.

19. Painting emotions inspired by classical music

I remember reading somewhere that this teacher would play songs to kids and ask them to paint what they feel or “see” with their imagination. One of the most beautiful recommendations was Peer Gynt’s Morning Mood. It’s an incredible piece of music, but this person suggested that most kids hearing it for the first time, without fail, would paint a depiction of sunrise.

I find it so interesting that a piece of music can be universally interpreted to signify the same thing—and by children! I’m not sure what the age readiness for this kind of exercise might b, but I’m excited to try it with my son, perhaps when he’s around 3. For now, we’re just really enjoying listening to this masterpiece.

20. Family members reading favorite books

It’s a Make Your Own Yoto card most popular idea. Sweet bonding time with family that lives close or far away. With modern technology being a source of a lot of today’s world’s problems, the way it connects families worldwide makes a good case for its presence in our lives.

Reading books can be recorded when family members visit and read with our child or remotely. We can send them pictures of pages of our child’s favorite book and ask them to record reading them on their phone. Any phone nowadays has a built-in voice recorder, and these files weigh nothing. Finding ways to keep family who live far from us involved in our child’s day-to-day life can help solidify their relationships.

21. Animal/bird sounds

Animal sounds are one of the first things we start instinctively teaching our babies when they learn to speak. My son was doing well with those, but we quickly realized (to our great surprise) that animals make different sounds in different languages.

For example, a rooster makes a “cock-a-doodle-doo” sound in English, “kukuryku” in Polish, and “cocorico” in Brazilian Portuguese. The horse “neighs” in English, “says” “iha” in Polish, and “patataj” when galloping, but the Brazilian horse gallops with the sound of “pocoto”. Safe to say, we were confused, and didn’t want my son to be confused either.

What better than the real animal sounds, though? I mean, except for a visit to the farm or a zoo. At the time, I bought a sound book with real animal photographs and their respective recordings. But MYO and some animal printouts can achieve the same thing.

23. Music for the seasons: winter, autumn, summer, spring

We’re not a big screen-time family, but when my son became obsessed with musical instruments, I wanted to show him how the orchestra works. We watched together a few videos with me explaining what’s happening on the stage. Besides him deciding he’s an orchestra conductor now, I found this amazing video that illustrates the themes and inspirations behind 4 seasons of Vivaldi in a beautiful, child-friendly way.

I’m not very fluent in classical music, but I love it, and I find this video very helpful. It opens so many fun activity possibilities, such as guessing the sound inspirations by season (this video explains them well, like dog barking, bird songs, rain, thunder, breeze, icy wind), guessing the season by the sounds, playing dress up, or drawing proper seasonal outerwear, etc.

Boston Baroque The Four Seasons by Vivaldi

MYO Card about season doesn’t need to mean Vivaldi. There are plenty of other songs and classical pieces to go along with each one of them.

24. I miss you and love you parent recording

When we need to leave for longer or travel, we can record a sweet message for our child to listen to whenever they want, regardless of how busy we are with work to make a phone call, of the time zone difference, etc.

This card could be used by our child when we are having another baby and go to the hospital to give birth while someone else stays home with our child. It’s not meant as a replacement for our care and love but as a thoughtful addition to it.

25. What I like about you, my baby

At different stages of our children’s lives, we can record a short vocal love letters to them—something like we would write to their e-mail that many parents like to set up for their newborns. “Hey, it’s January X, you’re Y months old. You learned to do A, B, C. I’m so proud of you. Today was the first day you said Z. You’re growing so fast, and it makes me happy, but it makes me a little sad at the same time. I love you so much. Mom”. I would absolutely love to listen to a playlist like that from my mom.

26. Orchestra instruments, each card featuring compositions with a leading instrument we want to learn about.

My son loves musical instruments. He already has a lot of little kid versions of them like guitar, maracas, piano, drums, xylophone etc. But he obviously can’t play them. My husband plays a bit on a guitar, but neither of us are professionals who can teach him at home.

I believe good musical exposure is the first step to music education. We can prepare MYO cards based on each instrument that’s often prevalent in a piece of music, like violin and cello suites and concertos, guitar ballads, famous drums featuring songs, piano pieces. I think this way we can help our children distinguish the instruments and their sounds beautifully.

27. Morning routine / bedtime routine.

A soundtrack has the potential to benefit any routine—a big-day routine, for example. A song for waking up, making breakfast, brushing teeth, and dressing up can become a set of cues that ease those transitions for our routine-loving children.

Summary

The most beautiful thing about Yoto’s open system is that the possibilities for custom MYO cards creation are endless. They can accompany us at different stages of our child’s development and age, and be a great addition to our teaching toolbox.