Do you know what’s lurking inside your child’s bath toys? Get rid of the bacteria for good!

Recently, a friend of mine was discussing her child’s squeezable bath toys and the disgusting bacteria that grow inside of them. I initially just blew her comment off not paying much attention to it, but when I got home, I started wondering, “what exactly is growing in my son’s bath toys?” Curiosity eventually got the best of me and I decided to cut one open.

I chose one we just had for about 6 months, and I also want to preface this by saying that we also clean our bath tub toys regularly with bleach water and we try to squirt out excess water after each bath. I thought for sure the bacteria growth couldn’t be that bad, but I was absolutely horrified when I cut one open!

I am embarrassed to show you this picture, but all moms out there MUST see this! Look at all of the disgusting black mold growing inside of there! Yuck!

I was horrified, and also bummed, because now I would have to throw away all of my son’s treasured bath toys. I thought we had always done the right thing to keep them clean, but I was wrong. I sadly threw them all away.

Thankfully, the same friend that was discussing the horrible bacteria also gave me a FANTASTIC tip on how to preserve the life of bath toys! She uses a hot glue gun to cover the blowhole of each bath toy to prevent water from entering, and eventually black mold from growing. What a genius idea—sure, my son won’t be able to squirt water in my face anymore, but hey, that is just an inconvenience I can live with!

Step 1: Find the blow hole on your bath toy.

Step 2: Take a hot glue gun and cover each blowhole with glue.

Step 3. Let glue sit for 15 minutes to completely dry and then your bath toys will be safe to enter the water for bath time fun!

Moms, be sure to hot glue those bath toy water holes for a truly clean bath!