bag weights/sandbags

Long story short- my institution decided to reorganize some curatorial departments and my department went from American Art to the 1950's to absorbing the Museums' collection of North Central and South America from 5000 BCE to the present. The department that this collection was part of before is keeping all of their handling materials. So we need to find or make a supply of small "sandbags" or snake weights. We use them to help us support items like fragile pots and bowls and other similar objects during transport through the museum and during storage, if needed. We've looked around at some of the supply companies and found some "lead filled bag weights" but they seem incredibly expensive at some of the more well known conservation supply resources. Do any of you have advice of other places I could look or even advice on making our own? The original supply was made by hand years ago and is a possibility if we can find and use the right materials.