Toys Galore

This morning I decided to tackle Carter's room and get it totally cleaned out. His closet was so full of blankets, coats, jackets, and toys. As I was cleaning his room along with two of my daycare girls, one by one we noticed some of Carter's new toys he got for Christmas were broken in the living room. I ended up finding six broken Christmas toys total so I put a plan together.

One thing I have noticed lately is that the kids won't pick up toys like they used to. I use to say "time to pick up everyone" and within five minutes the place was clean. Not anymore. I started thinking about what changed and why so many toys were being broken when it came to mind that there were just way too many toys available. Everything would be dumped and on the floor by 9am and then pick up time would last 45+ minutes.

I put myself at a 3 year-old's level and thought...I wouldn't want to pick up this many toys. It looks like a never-ending job. One thing with kids is if the job looks too big, they often lose enthusiasm to finish something. Well, these kids were breaking toys from stepping on so many others that were all over the floor, and not being able to help it since the floor was completely covered.

I set to work getting Carter's room finished. Then I moved a big toy box in there and put his Christmas toys and his other toys in there for him to play with. Then I put an organizer that Grandma Mary gave us in the girls' room. I had hoped with the organizer the kids could put things away in the corrects places so they could see what they had to play with. That never happened. They just pulled the drawers out and spilled everything onto the floor and then didn't know which bins to put the toys in when it was time to pick everything back up.

The problem is now solved. Every toy of Carter's, Kylah's, and Kaitlin's are now in their rooms and every daycare toy except the ones I threw away (four full trash bags!) are now in two large laundry baskets.

Pick up time was only a five minute ordeal before lunch today, just like it used to be. I don't know how I didn't realize so many toys had been added the past few months to the toy area. I kind of felt bad to eliminate so many, but also knew there would be a lot less tripping over toys, and unnecessary picking up to do.