I want to get rid of all the toys in my house

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It might help to have the kids rank the toys in the order they like them, so they can begin to internalize that even if they like something, not all things are equal.

Can you say more about how the toys are bothering you? No room for all of them? Kids don't help put them away? If you help them start understanding that everything has to have its own place to go (e.g. not all crammed into a jumble somewhere) it might be a starting place. You could quietly remove some and see if they ask about them, but it's better in the long run if they can be in on it because they get a better understanding of what fits and what doesn't fit, rather than relying on someone else to regulate that for them.

Ranking for the big kids should work.

The problem, maybe not a real problem, is that the younger kids or younger kids’ friends may want to play with the older kid’s toys that are no longer his favorite.

I’m bothered because our house looks like a big clutter of plastic junk.

The younger kids don't have to have all the things. I have finally gotten to this point with some of our stuff - we've got three kids, the youngest is 2 yo and there are no cousins on either side, so we have every baby and toddler toy known to man. And I finally realized last week, if we have a fourth, he/she will survive without a Fisher Price popcorn popper or a Baby Einstein take-along-tunes. Those things served our 3 kids well, but I can now pass on about half of the baby and toddler stuff and still have plenty for a hypothetical little sibling. If your older kids have a dozen dinos, you can get rid of half and you'll still have a good number of dinos for the littlest one to play with when he's older.

[Anonymous]

Have less kids and less toys. Deal with it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It might help to have the kids rank the toys in the order they like them, so they can begin to internalize that even if they like something, not all things are equal.

Can you say more about how the toys are bothering you? No room for all of them? Kids don't help put them away? If you help them start understanding that everything has to have its own place to go (e.g. not all crammed into a jumble somewhere) it might be a starting place. You could quietly remove some and see if they ask about them, but it's better in the long run if they can be in on it because they get a better understanding of what fits and what doesn't fit, rather than relying on someone else to regulate that for them.

Ranking for the big kids should work.

The problem, maybe not a real problem, is that the younger kids or younger kids’ friends may want to play with the older kid’s toys that are no longer his favorite.

I’m bothered because our house looks like a big clutter of plastic junk.

The younger kids don't have to have all the things. I have finally gotten to this point with some of our stuff - we've got three kids, the youngest is 2 yo and there are no cousins on either side, so we have every baby and toddler toy known to man. And I finally realized last week, if we have a fourth, he/she will survive without a Fisher Price popcorn popper or a Baby Einstein take-along-tunes. Those things served our 3 kids well, but I can now pass on about half of the baby and toddler stuff and still have plenty for a hypothetical little sibling. If your older kids have a dozen dinos, you can get rid of half and you'll still have a good number of dinos for the littlest one to play with when he's older.

I'll add, I don't feel bad about the younger ones having less toys because a) they are going to get a bunch of gifts over time that add to general amount of crap in our house and b) I swear my older two don't even remotely appreciate the stuff they have because there is so freaking much of it.

One thing that helped me, besides purging, was organizing and making sure the kids adhere to the organizational scheme. If I could get good at making them put things away right away like some other people are, then I'd be in really good shape.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It might help to have the kids rank the toys in the order they like them, so they can begin to internalize that even if they like something, not all things are equal.

Can you say more about how the toys are bothering you? No room for all of them? Kids don't help put them away? If you help them start understanding that everything has to have its own place to go (e.g. not all crammed into a jumble somewhere) it might be a starting place. You could quietly remove some and see if they ask about them, but it's better in the long run if they can be in on it because they get a better understanding of what fits and what doesn't fit, rather than relying on someone else to regulate that for them.

Ranking for the big kids should work.

The problem, maybe not a real problem, is that the younger kids or younger kids’ friends may want to play with the older kid’s toys that are no longer his favorite.

I’m bothered because our house looks like a big clutter of plastic junk.

I think this is a you problem. You won't get rid of a toy because your younger child may have a *friend* who wants to play with it someday? This is a little crazy. Get rid of the toys that your kids don't play with anymore. If he's over his PJ Masks phase then just get rid of the toys. Don't keep them because his friend Timmy likes to play wiith them when he comes over for his monthly playdate. You could even just give them to Timmy.

[Anonymous]

Just put all the toys in the basement...eliminate them from the main floor. My kids have a lot of toys but they stay in their area so I don't hate them so much

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Pack up half in rubbermaid totes and put them out of sight for a few months. Then rotate.

This. Also - they are only kids for so long. Let them have their toys. Your house doesnt have to be perfect.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It might help to have the kids rank the toys in the order they like them, so they can begin to internalize that even if they like something, not all things are equal.

Can you say more about how the toys are bothering you? No room for all of them? Kids don't help put them away? If you help them start understanding that everything has to have its own place to go (e.g. not all crammed into a jumble somewhere) it might be a starting place. You could quietly remove some and see if they ask about them, but it's better in the long run if they can be in on it because they get a better understanding of what fits and what doesn't fit, rather than relying on someone else to regulate that for them.

Ranking for the big kids should work.

The problem, maybe not a real problem, is that the younger kids or younger kids’ friends may want to play with the older kid’s toys that are no longer his favorite.

I’m bothered because our house looks like a big clutter of plastic junk.

I think this is a you problem. You won't get rid of a toy because your younger child may have a *friend* who wants to play with it someday? This is a little crazy. Get rid of the toys that your kids don't play with anymore. If he's over his PJ Masks phase then just get rid of the toys. Don't keep them because his friend Timmy likes to play wiith them when he comes over for his monthly playdate. You could even just give them to Timmy.

I have 2 boys and a little girl. Many of my friends have boys so they are the ones who like to come over and they all play with cars, trains and dinosaurs. It isn’t someday. They always play.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Pack up half in rubbermaid totes and put them out of sight for a few months. Then rotate.

This. Also - they are only kids for so long. Let them have their toys. Your house doesnt have to be perfect.

This is fair. My daughter will be in preschool for 2 more years.

I’m going to try to put the majority of the toys in the basement and only allow a few toys upstairs. The toys won’t bother me as much if I don’t have to constantly see them.

And I will start giving away items. We don’t need 100 dinosaurs. I will keep 10-20. And those dinotrux and switch and go dinosaurs my friends’ kids like so much. They can just have them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Pack up half in rubbermaid totes and put them out of sight for a few months. Then rotate.

This is what we do. But some also dissappear during the process.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I never did this, but I always thought there's a good window here for parents to take advantage of the fact that kids have no concept of money. Offer them $1 or something for each toy they agree to donate to charity. (Make clear that it doesn't apply to each single lego, or each toy soldier or whatever...). I bet for $100, you can solve this problem for yourself and everyone is happy.

The books don't bother me. Each of my kids has about 200 to 1000 books in their room, but they read them all the time so that's fine. Books store well, aren't unsightly and don't take up that much space. I love the really tall Billy Bookscases from Ikea -- just line the walls with those and you can keep a LOT of books.

Stuffed animals are the worst. They are vaguely anthropomorphic so no one wants to throw them in the trash (see, e.g., incinerator scene in Toy Story III), and the shelters mostly don't want them due to mold and bed bug concerns. I loved stuffies as a kid, but now that I have kids, I will never give another as a gift.

I got off of Amazon this really cool storage accessory for stuffed animals. It’s the bean bag chair exterior and you shove all of your stuffed animals in there and you have your own makeshift bean bag chair!

[Anonymous]

I just periodically throw stuff away when they haven't used it for a few months. It's worked fairly well so far. Legos are a problem because all of their sets are complicated (like, 700 pieces or more) and dismantling and organizing would be a nightmare. But everything else gets tossed after a couple years, on average.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It might help to have the kids rank the toys in the order they like them, so they can begin to internalize that even if they like something, not all things are equal.

Can you say more about how the toys are bothering you? No room for all of them? Kids don't help put them away? If you help them start understanding that everything has to have its own place to go (e.g. not all crammed into a jumble somewhere) it might be a starting place. You could quietly remove some and see if they ask about them, but it's better in the long run if they can be in on it because they get a better understanding of what fits and what doesn't fit, rather than relying on someone else to regulate that for them.

Ranking for the big kids should work.

The problem, maybe not a real problem, is that the younger kids or younger kids’ friends may want to play with the older kid’s toys that are no longer his favorite.

I’m bothered because our house looks like a big clutter of plastic junk.

I think this is a you problem. You won't get rid of a toy because your younger child may have a *friend* who wants to play with it someday? This is a little crazy. Get rid of the toys that your kids don't play with anymore. If he's over his PJ Masks phase then just get rid of the toys. Don't keep them because his friend Timmy likes to play wiith them when he comes over for his monthly playdate. You could even just give them to Timmy.

I have 2 boys and a little girl. Many of my friends have boys so they are the ones who like to come over and they all play with cars, trains and dinosaurs. It isn’t someday. They always play.

Even with the frequency of play dates you have described, you don’t need to keep all of the “boy toys” from your older kids for boys who are there a couple hours a week. It’s a good idea to have some toys they like so they will stay out of your hair while you chat with your friends, but I’m assuming it’s not the same boys coming every day so they won’t get bored with the same toys every week as they would if they were tepheir own toys.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Pack up half in rubbermaid totes and put them out of sight for a few months. Then rotate.

Yup this

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote: One thing that helped me, besides purging, was organizing and making sure the kids adhere to the organizational scheme. If I could get good at making them put things away right away like some other people are, then I'd be in really good shape.

Organizing it helped me as well. We have a smaller place than OP (no basement playroom) so I got a cube bookcase with bins from Costco where each bin is roughly one type of toy (dolls, balls, vehicles, Mr. Potato head, doctor kits, etc.). It didn't help with the larger Little People sets, but everything else goes into a bin and helps me with the visual toy clutter in the living room.

[Anonymous]

Pack up the things they don't seem to be playing with (your kids, not their friends). Put them where they can't see them. If they haven't asked for them in a set amount of time, donate them. And onto the next batch.

We had a rule that for every toy that enters the house, one has to leave. It gets the kids to think really hard about what it is they really want.