Toy Problem!!

Once my kids have too many toys they actually get bored. They are over stimulated. So what I do is pack up some opf the toys leaving them with fewer and after a while unpack some and pack up others. This way they always have something new to play with...

Hi! I have two kids 3 1/2 and 18 months. WE have one room full of just toys and an attic with car and train sets so I know how you feel. I recently went through all the toys and donated to Hope for the Holidays in my area. I then organized them witht the drawer storage units. The boys now keep things a lot more picked up and its' easier for them each to get things they want without taking from each other. We still have a toy box with the big things lilke dump rucks and stuff but it's made my world and theirs a whole lot easier.

I know exactly how you feel. I only have one, but he can be really selfish at times. But I don't think that there is neccessarily too many toys, considering the fact that you have three children. But I think that just going through and weeding out what she really don't play with anymore is a good start. I just put all my son's toys that he don't play with in a bag, and put in the goodwill box. He was acting like he was going to die, but forgot about them that same day.

I think you already know that you have too many toys. Noone can tell you exactly how many toys to have but you do need to get it under control. This is a good time to teach your child that there are children out there who have nothing and that she is very fortunate. If you still can't get her to understand (it is a hard concept for them) then I suggest what I have to do with ym six year old. With the toys I got a moving box (the tall kind that is meant to hold clothes) and as you are cleaning go through one section a day and pitch anything she really doesn't use much into the box. Do this once or twice a day and eventually you will clean out the area. Find a storage solution that works for you. There are plenty of products you can puchase. I have limited space so I have a bag system (I sewed them myself from fabric on the $1 table at WalMart) and have hooks for them to hang on. Each thing gets its own bag. All of my sons tools have a bag. The Barbies have a bag. You get the idea. Anything that doesn't have a home after your done organizing (eg. all those McDonalds toys) get pitched. Once you feel you have it under control then I suggest the 1-1 rule. For every new toy they get, they have to give one away. I also have stopped getting my kids toys except at birthdays and holidays. I say we had to wait until Santa brought it and it didn't ruin us. Good Luck.

hi , i am a mom of 4 and i know how you feel. what i did was go through the toys, and weed out the ones they dont play with anymore, and i gave my kids toys to freecycle.com, its a wonderfull site and your things go to people that need them. with the rest of the toys, you can sort them into different kinds and makes little bins....( i even used clothes baskets) and put a picture on it and told my littles ones what to put in , and they enjoyed picking up the toys after that, i have no problem getting them to help anymore. they think its a game. hope this works for you too.

Oh K....

Christmas must be coming....I swear I go thru the same thing every year and vow "enough is enough"! I am definitely a believer of less is more (and believe me, my kids have more than I'd like to see them have). I first of all don't start a big clean out until the kids are out of the house, this of course avoids the fight of "hey, I want that". There are plenty of charities that will accept good, used toys and this is definitely the time to do it.

I just try and go thru what they have and really ask, "is this something they are using?" If it's something they haven't used in a while, pass it on. If it's something that doesn't hold sentimental value, get rid of it. Chances are if your kids aren't getting to it, they've even forgotten they had it in the first place. My kids gravitate to the same things over and over, so that's what you keep and cycle out the rest. I've also gotten to the point that if games are missing pieces, pitch them. Admit it, it happens to all of us. Your kids won't get the games out anyway if they're missing pieces, and may be when you do that big "clean-out" you'll find missing pieces.

I've definitely found that a toy box doesn't work - it doesn't allow the kids to see what they have. I'm a big believer in shelves and bins and I've even drawn pictures of what goes in each bin for my 5 year old who can't read yet. That $50 bin set I got at Target has been invaluable. I think you've always got to be going thru their things to move stuff on. Another place that I found got out of control was our book shelf. As are kids grow, their book tastes change. This is always a good chance to share with someone else, or again, donate them to a good cause, charity, rummage sale, whatever.

I take those big garbage bags and put them right in my van - out of sight out of mind.

As for Christmas, I'm deciding to let people know that a small gift card is fine - something my kids and I can do on a rainy day say in March or April. I really think from Mom and Dad (or Santa!) 3 - 4 gifts is sufficient. Books are great, play-doh and crafty things are fun too - I always like to replenish those "re-newable" activities. I then don't feel like I've got this $50 toy just sitting around not being used.

Okay, well those are my random thoughts for the morning - I hope that helps. Hang in there and know that us other good moms are out there fighting the good fight and trying to get organized as Christmas looms.

Something that my parents used to do with me and my brother was in November they would make us pick at least 5 toys that we didn't play with anymore to take to toys for tots. It taught us how to share and help out the community of children who didn't get toys from "santa". My parents in return would buy us however many toys we gave away (unless it was all of them of course, which one year my brother and i tried to do) It will help your daughter learn how to give as well as recieve. To this day I do this with my 6 yr old. He has a blast and actually loves taking the toys himself down to the Shelter. Also in lorain there is a group on yahoo it's called Lorain Freecycle. It's for people who want to get rid of things they no longer use as well as find things they need or want for their family.

I go thru toys often!
If there are junky and broken or just goofy little toys then i toss them out. Esp the happy meal toys!!

As for good toys that work and are nice I either dontate them or freecycle them. Theres always kids out there who dont have many or any at all and would LOVE them!
Ask churches or daycares, or schools with lil ones in it.
Theres also goodwills or salvation army too..
or if youd like to make a lil off them try takling them to a second hand store (babyland, twice around for kids, ect) or just put them in the paper!

Theres alot of things to do!

Ive helped all my friends get organized, if you want to talk more them just drop me an email sometime!

K., I love your question because it's one so many of us have faced, are facing or will face. When my own were little and reluctant to help clean up, we used the 8 pm rule. If all the toys were not picked up by 8 pm, anything left out became ours. At first, we would bag the things up and make them earn the toys back, but when that stopped working, we bagged the things up and gave them away. That was not an easy rule to enforce as some things I knew they loved and I hated to get rid of them, but it was so very effective.

When it came to tackling the toys in the living room, we only allowed one toy at a time. If they stopped playing with that toy, they had to put it away before getting out the next.

As far as the number of toys, there is nothing wrong with having a lot, but studies have shown that rotating the toys is an effective way to help your children get the most from their play time. Get a couple large containers and sort through the toys. Put some in storage and every few months change bins. The kids may not like this at first, but what happens later is that your children will look forward to the switch and rediscovering their toys all over again.

Lastly, another good way to weed out the toys is through Craig's list. http://columbus.craigslist.org/ You can list the items for free or offer them for sale.

Infinite Blessings!

Every year close to the month of December i usually go thru both my kids' toyboxes. Usually it's the happy meal toys that get the boot first but i set my son aside and have him pick out his favorites and we usually find friends or neighbors with younger kids to take the good toys. Or i just bag them all and take them to goodwill and let them deal with it. If it was during the warmer days you could have a yard sale. the money earned from that could go into a big item that your child may want. swing set. new bike. stuff like that. we usually just give one present from Santa. Making it a special gift. we usually reserve giving them everything they want cause there's always birthdays. My kids each have their own toy boxes and if the toys are so much that they're spilling out of their rooms then it's time to go thru it. Also instead of getting presents from relatives, we get money and it goes into the boys' savings account used for major items. Like my oldest son went to cub scout camp which cost $100 , the money that was saved in the account went towards that so he was able to go. I hope this helps some.

Like most of the moms that have responded already I too know how you feel. I have a 5 yr daughter who has a lot of toys, but certainly not as many as some. I have all the toys sorted into clear stackable totes. She is only supposed to take 1 tote out at a time, which works well until we have someone over for a play date.

I regards to clean up, most of the time I leave it up to her. If she doesn't clean up her toys I will which will mean that they will either be taken away, given away or thrown away & yes I have carried out my threat so she knows that if I come in she is going to lose something.

Last year my husband and I decided we would take Christmas back to basics. We want to make sure our daughter understand the real reason for the season. This meant that Santa only brought her 1 toy & it wasn't a 'big' toy, just something she really wanted. We didn't buy her too many gifts from us. This work well for us and we'll continue to do this in the future.

My kids have the same issue. What we did to solve it is we went through all their toys and made them choose 3 or 4 that they'd like to keep out. All the rest got put away. Then, every 3 or so months we pull them all out and they can switch out the ones they have or keep them. This serves several purposes. First of all, it cleans up the room, but secondly, it's like they get brand new toys every few months. So nothing ever becomes boring.

Hope that helps :)

I agree with what most of the moms have said and i definately know your pain. One day I had just had it and I could not stand the clutter any more. After asking my kids to pick up their toys for millionth time I got out trash bags after they got on the bus and I put everything in the playroom in trash bags. It was a great way to vent and work out my anger. I ended up with 16 large trash bags. I put the bags in the closet. When they got home from school boy were they shocked. The deal was they had the chance to earn back a bag a week. They earned it back by good behavior. They also had to clean out the bag when they opened it up. Put away, give away or throw away. The amazing thing is they were just find with out toys. All they wanted was a Polly Pocket a piece and some papre and crayons.

My sister n law found that she and her children would sort through their toys and give some away. If the children couldn't pick something mom would. That way the kids had more incentive to pick something. It gave thema sense of charity and some discipline too. Her son has a hard time with it everytime but her daughter doesn't. Either way they are getting a lesson out of it.

Maybe you could put a portion of them away. Have your kids pick out their favorite ones and put the rest away. If you never see your kids playing with something, put it away. Then, you can rotate them periodically. Bring out the ones you have in storage and put some in storage. Also, make sure you have shelves. You could put labels on the shelf where things go and remind them to always put back a toy before getting out a new one. You may have to stay on top of them or help them put things away since they are pretty young.

Since you may be getting alot from family members for your kids at Christmas time, you shouldn't feel the need to buy a lot of presents for them yourself. If quantity is an issue, go to the dollar store. They are young enough not to care or know how much things cost.

I have an almost three year old son that has too many toys also and is starting to be controlling & selfish with these toys...So, we made some ground rules...When we are at the store, if he asks for a toy he absolutely will not get anything, no matter how well behaved he is. we will go look so he can play with the neat Thomas set up that they have, but he cannot ask and if he is good he gets something probably once out of every six trips...We just had our second child so we are trying to make it no trips...But we're getting there:) Also, we go through his toys every couple of months and take out things he is no longer playing with - some we put aside for the younger one, but the rest we explain to him we are donating to our city's free store for kids who don't have any...Surprisingly he gave up his pacifier to the free store - we obviously didn't donate that, but he feels proud to give to other kids that don't have toys...And our last ground rule is that if he is given something we get rid of something. We have always had clearly defined areas for toys...So he has never had a problem with clean up time...For example - we have a cube storage area with four canvas bins...Two have THomas divided into tracks in one and trains in the other and the other two have kitchen items, food in one and dishes in the other. We have a basket by the toy box for all the bob the builder and then the toy box has a seperate smaller box inside for cars...Everything else just goes in the box. I have found that children play better if things are all in their "place" when they start. I feel for you...It's hard to lay down the law...But when I see older kids who so clearly have no boundaries it reminds me what to do...

its been my experience that kids don't just know how to share. they MUST be taught. I also, know it is hard not to spoil our kids. But as a parent you have to be incharge. To many toys will spoil a child. Keep your kids favorate toys and have a nice garage sale with the rest. I let my kids keep the money from their toys. That is a great incentive for them to get rid of toys that they really don't want. I also include my child in the selling process, and encourage him to Give toys to kids that look like they need them and want them. He really felt good about making another child smile with his old toys.

When it comes to the old toys you can either have a yard/garage sale or donate them to a women's shelter for women that have childern. For christmas buy more toys that grow with your children so they can use them for years to come. Hope that helps a little.

Hello, I can relate to your dilemma. I usually take a saturday and send the kids with grandma and grandpa around Christmas time and clean house. I get rid of all the toys that are missing too many pieces to really be played with and all the toys in good condition that they either don't play with any more or are just too young for them, I give to Good Will. Also, my three year old loves to clean up now that we sing the clean up song by Laurie Berkner. You can find it at Noggin.com if you don't know it. It is the only way she'll clean up her toys, but if we sing it, she actually will do most the job herself. I hope this helps. Let me know.

T. R.

I don't think any parent knows what a good number of toys is. I also have three wonderful children that have lots of toys. So what we do is put some in boxes or trash bags and put them in the basement or attack(which ever you perfer)for a cpl months and when they get bored with the toys that they have to play with now i swap them out for the ones i packed away for a few months.It really works. My kids forget we even had them toys so to them they are new toys all over again. As for the x-mas time. I'm not sure how other parents do it but each of my kids get on thing they really want then may a small toy or two and rest clothes. It works here for me. So hopefully i was able to help you out a lil bit. M. W

when I feel that my kids have accumulated too manytoys, I tell them, that they need to clean up. I give them a certain amount of spce to put their toys in, and what doesn't fit, I give away. I feel that this work well, because it gives them a sense of resposabiliy, in having to clean up their own toys, and also gives them the choice as to which toys they really really want, they will put their favorite toys away first, because it is usually near the top of the mess, since it gets the most action. and on top of that, they are learning about needing, and wanting. My daughters had a hard time with this the first few times we did it, but then they got the idea, and now, they are on the ball, whenever I say ok girls we gotta clean up, they run in and pick up the toys they love, and these days, they even bring the ones they don't like much to me, and say, Mommy I don't need this anymore, can we give it away? its awesome.

Hi there!! Well, I have only one child, an 11 year old son, his toys are all over as well, but I could suggest this one...my girlfriend and her hubby have 2 small children, a boy and a girl, ages 2 and 4....THEY have a gazillion toys, BIG TIME!!! they always have birthday parties for the kids and end up with tons more toys each year, so, I heard them talking about getting rid of as many toys as the kids get new as gifts at the parties...as far as organizing what's left....do you have the room to put in some sort of shelving, like in the play room? I've seen shelving and storage containers in Target before that appear to be child safe and specially made for children in the furniture/houseware department...I don't know if it would be of any help to you though...My son likes to try getting things done by using a timer...he likes to try "beating the clock" before the buzzer/dinger goes off, do you think THAT might be an option for your kids to help clean up? Maybe another idea could be singing and dancing along to fun kids music as they clean or try making a game out of it somehow...As far as how many gifts Santa should bring...Are there a lot of others outside of your home that give the kids a lot of gifts? If so, I would consider saying maybe not more than 3 per child...A co-worker of mine doesn't give more than 3 gifts per grandchild in relation to the "three wise men" with the gifts they brought to baby Jesus...I don't know if any of these suggestions can help, but I thought I'd offer some suggestions...Hope they help!!! C. H.

HI! I completely understand! Now, we just give our girls an expensive, long lasting present for Christmas. We then give them smaller presents that are fun for them, but what they need like, fun bandaids, fun toothbrushes, food they love, etc...
As for getting rid of stuff, offer them for free, other mamasource moms could come and pick them up. Donate them to thrift type stores. It will make you feel good to help others and get rid of things!
I taught my children to clean up well by saying if they don't clean up then they do not deserve to keep all the toys, that way I got rid of some of their items, that taught them responsiblity from the age of 3 and to clean well:-)
Get rid of anything that they do not play with a lot! It will make life so much easier!
Good Luck!

I think this would be a perfect time to teach your kids a great, valuable lesson. Explain to them how lucky they are to have toys since some children don't have anything and ask them if they'd like to give a child a toy. Mention how happy the toys have made them and explain how happy it would make a child who doesn't have anything. I would then have them pick out a certain number of toys and take them to either a drop off box, or ask if children services, or some other agency could use them. You could also freecycle them on the yahoo group. As for toys from santa, I would chose ones they will use for a while, like educational ones.

K.,

This is what we do at our house. About every 6 months we have a purge session, we send the kids away to grandmas then hubby and i purge the toys. You know what they really play with and what they don't. We take the unplayed with toys to the daycare center or the church for recycling.

Trying to get the kids to pick up is another problem. We finally told them that their toys are their responsibility if they are where they don't belong we tell them to put them away and if we have to do it they get thrown away. (we really hide them in a closet and get them out after about a week) you should only have to do it a couple of times then they know you are serious.

Hope this is helpful.

M.

If they are toys that are all being played with on a regular basis, then I would simply box some up and put away. Then rotate them monthly (pick the same date every month so you don't forget when you last rotated). As you pull toys out of the box, put different ones in to be store for the next month. You could label the box or keep a list stored on your computer (or wherever) of what's in storage. As for getting kids to clean up... beating the timer is a good one or when all else fails.... threaten that what isn't picked up will be given away. (But, you have to follow through so they know you mean it!) At our house Santa brings each child 3 presents. This symbolizes the 3 gifts of the wise men to baby Jesus. They get plenty of other presents from Grandma/pa and gift exchanges with cousins. We find the less the have the more they play with it!! Find the favorites and weed out the rest! Hope this helps!!

Rotate the toys, get rid of toys that don't have all of the pieces or are broken, and decide how much space you are willing to give to toys and confine the toys to that space. If you start getting too many again, get rid of ones that aren't getting much use. A trick- you could take a few of the ones that you think they aren't playing with, and put them in a box for a month. If they don't ask for them and you think the youngest one won't miss it, it's time for them to find a new home. As far as organizing, try putting like with like first. All the legos together, all the dolls together, all the craft supplies together, books together, etc. Do that first, and see what you've got. Purge as you go. When you are done with that, set a limit on what can be in the living room upstairs (2 toys per child, or 1 basket worth, whatever works for you), and set a limit on how much space they can have downstairs. Put the toys that require supervision on the very top shelves. Put toys for younger kids and toys that are used frequently on the lower shelves. Use baskets or bins or totes with lids to contain toys, and label the front. Put a picture of what is in the bin on the outside of the bin, so that even the little ones can understand what goes in that bin. Have designated areas for toys so the kids always know where the toys go, and label the shelves if you need to. Make the kids pick up their toys at the end of playtime so the area stays picked up, or you will constantly have to be re-organizing all the time, and you will drive yourself crazy. Another good tip is for them to only have one or two toys out at a time. I hope this helps! =)

I have two daughters and anytime we have an event (birthday, Christmas, etc) we go through all the toys and I tell them that we are going to take some of the toys and give them to little kids who do not have any. I ask my oldest (she is 3.5 yo) to help pick out some toys that she doesn't want to play with anymore or that she would like to give away. Obviously, I monitor this to be sure she doesn't give away a keepsake item, but for the most part she usually picks the things that she thinks other little kids would like. I then donate these toys. It really does help keep things managable and I hope will teach them to be grateful that they have so many toys. The first time we did this, we got rid of quite a few boxes!!! Hope this helps a little!

Some where along the line my Dad's family started this thing around the holidays. It's like pass the toys down. It was great at first but my son accumulated those toys along from all my cousins and such, and new toys. So in the end it was a HUGE problem. So, we too started to pass things along. There are two ways of doing this. One friend of ours passes all the things that she would accept in to her household (gently used toys and clothes) to the people she knew who needed it. If you don't know anyone who needs it, donate to a children's hospital, children's home or a low income day care. They greatly appericate these donations!
How to get your kids involved? I explained to my 3 year old that there are other children in the world that don't have toys in their homes and schools and Santa doesn't always make it to them at Christmas time. My concerned son asked what they did, and I told them that they depend on other little kids to share their toys when they are done playing with them. So my son and I sit down every once in awhile, and go through his toys that he doesn't play with much anymore or has outgrown to pass on. We also take all the toys that are broken and missing pieces out at this time. It works great with my son. It's kind of like Clean Sweep: You have three piles, the keep pile, give away pile and throw away pile. Completely empty out the room and only put back in that what you are keeping. It might take awhile but it helps a lot! (AND your helping others along the way!!!)

Hi! I had the same problem, my son is our only child and the only Grandchild, nephew, etc., so he gets alot of toys, they were everywhere, livingroom, bedroom, you name the place, there were toys, including his own room filled with them at my Mother's and my older sisters, LOL! Anyway, what I did was take all the toys I hadn't seen him play with in a while to Once Upon A Child and sold them to fund his new clothes, then what they didn't buy, I donated to Goodwill. I now have my house back and he still hAS A DECENT AMOUNT OF TOYS IN HIS BEDROOM AND A FEW DOWNSTAIRS IN THE LIVINGROOM and I got a break on the cost of new clothes, LOL! Hope that helps!