Today Simon tackled the boys room and we finally went through the books and got rid of quite a few, next are the toys.

Toys are hard to de-clutter, especially with 4 kids. Some toys are played with, some are not, some are outgrown, some are just being grown into. In any case, we have way too many and the kids are not ready to let go. I don’t know what to do. I used to have an addiction to buying cheap used toys or other things. I found so many great deals but the mess and clutter just grew and grew.

A few years ago I finally decided to make the change. To stop buying, to stop cluttering up the house with stuff that we really didn’t need or wouldn’t use and start getting things under control. Over the last few years we have gotten rid so much stuff, including toys, often by putting them in storage and them having them disappear. Now I can often skip that step and no longer have such an emotional attachment as I used to. Xavier however, is a lot like me and has trouble letting go so it makes things hard at time.

If I could go back, I would have done things differently.  I loved when I was at Annie‘s that there were just not many toys. A mess was easy to clean up. I wish that we would have stayed minimalist when it came to that, to everything really. But now that we have them it is such a hard thing to deal with.

Our problem is the bulk of the toys… the Legos, the Playmobils, the Star Wars figurines and ships. All toys that are played with often but all have little pieces that make a playroom look like a dump within the span of a few minutes…

We have tried so many things to keep things under control to no avail. The room is always chaos, and of course, when there is a mess, they are less likely to use the space; and when they use the space, they make a mess. It is a vicious cycle. The boys are in change of cleaning the space, and once in a while we would step in and help. It is too much though, for all of us and we have had enough of the chaos.

So, Today is the day that we are tackling it.

The things that have a home, can keep their home. The rest is up for grabs. We have a bin. A large bin with a top. What can fit in it can stay. The rest will go.

So… how do you keep the toys under control? Who is in charge of cleaning the toys space? How do you dea with kids that have trouble letting go?