how many toys do you leave accessible?

[Spring Lily]

I mentioned in another thread that I am constantly picking up toys or after the kids to pick them up. It's getting old--for all of us! I do rotate them, but a lot are on the shelves at any given time and my kids are the type to get out 5 different types of toys at once and scatter them around the entire house.

I felt like it is pretty fairly split between what I leave out and have stashed away, but maybe I should have more stashed? The worst problem is really the kitchen & dress up stuff. They play with that constantly and it is like shrapanel all over the floor. Every floor. If I take it away, they just use the dinosaurs or trains or blocks to cook with, like that's food instead. I hate to take it away when they are so driven by that play, but picking it up everyday kills my back and makes me want to cry.

Someone said that I have too many toys out and it made me wonder what do other people do?


I can give you an example of my current toy situation for my 3 kids (ages 2-4). (The art & playdough stuff is only pulled out when I can supervise and they're all seated.)

On their shelves:
2 bins of dress up clothes & shoes
a stack of wooden puzzles
2 small dollhouses & a castle
10 small dolls for those houses & 5 fairies
baby dolls
stuffed animals
dinosaur set
cars & trucks
books--a LOT
musical instruments (kazoos, harmonicas, a drum, etc)
play kitchen
play food
play dishes & cooking implements


Out of rotation right now:
1 bin of dress up clothes & shoes
all cardboard puzzles & 3 floor puzzles
art & craft supplies, including crayons & paper
playdough
stamp kits
trains & tracks (& buildings)
wooden blocks
foam blocks
alphabet blocks
shape sorters
a big box of books
lacing cards

Wow that sounds like a lot!


Help! What toys do you leave out for the kids?

[mommariffic]

DD plays with a LOT throughout the day and I am trying to establish stations around our house

In the main play area (which is my family room, we don't have a playroom) she has:

Wooden castle & castle dudes and dudettes 

Farm & her animals for the farm

Baskets with things like play silks, beanie babies (she's obsessed and my Dad gets them for her) and little odds and ends

Doll bed + doll

Play kitchen & purple cabinet with play food 

BOOKS galore (I try to rotate some of these in the book basket which has seasonal books)

In the craft room we have...craft and music stuff/dress up station being made 

Upstairs in her room there's a few dolls and a dollhouse that's empty. 

She just plays with all of it throughout the day. Puzzles and school-type stuff I keep in the closet but whew by the end of the day there's stuff everywhere so I need (and she does too!) to keep on top of it. 

[Spring Lily]

That doesn't sound so different than whatyse have. I can't imagine having stations, my kids drag everything everywhere. Does your DD keep the stuff near where it belongs?

Tonight I reached my last straw and took everything away except for 3 things that they picked. The chose dress up, trains, and foam blocks. I said that the trains have to stay in the bedroom where they are, the dress up clothes can be worn around the house but not taken off and left around, and the foam blocks are the only things that can be out in the main room.

It's kind of extreme, but I really am at my limit. And I do admit that my back hurts from cleaning and my throat hurts from yelling. Tonight didn't go well for me! But what did Scarlett O'Hara say, tomorrow is another day...

[treeoflife3]

No, I don't rotate toys.  We don't really have any storage space I care to give up to toy storage so kiddo only gets the amount of toys I'm willing to have out all the time and pick up.

Right now, I'd say she has too many toys and books but half of that problem is that we are in a transition from baby toys to toddler toys so my organization is seriously lacking.  I need to purge more baby things she doesn't care to play with anymore and I don't care to save for the next child and get what she will have left better organized with space for new things as she grows.  It also feels like she has too much because she honestly doesn't play with a lot of it unless you count dumping it all out and walking away as playing hehe.

She has:

a wooden kitchen with some wooden food

the plan toys sorter bus

a pull along telephone

a few puzzles

a fabric grocery bag full of assorted dolls and figurines and vehicles and small stuffed animals (the bulk of her toys)

a small wooden xylophone

a three block pounding thing

a large activity cube

a small activity cube (both of her grandmas gave her one for her birthday haha.  I don't plan on both staying!)

a net that hangs on the ceiling of stuffed animals (a couple are always down)

a tricycle

an alphabet abacus (her favorite toy)

All of it fits onto one cabinet thing (couple feet tall, two shelves, doors) in the living room except of course the kitchen, trike, and net of stuffed animals.  She also has one of those nine cubed book shelf things that currently has three of the cubes overflowing with books.

[Marissamom]

my 20 month old has out in the living-room, her kitchen with a few dished etc (only about 20 pieces). her shelf of books, her v-tech alphabet train, her doll stroller, and one basket (about a foot across and a foot high) of miscellaneous toys. all her other toys are in her room, but she doesn't play in there very much because we spend most of our time in the living-room, and the bedrooms are upstairs, and the stairs are gated.