Keeping Toys off the floor?

[Outnumbered]

My DD still dumps too. And now my twins have learned from her. I'm a huge Dave Ramsey fan, so we have tied her cleanup in with her "commission." She cleans up all of her toys throughout the whole house every night before bed. If she does it the whole week then I give her $2 to put in her chore jar. And I give her $.50 or $1 for little things that she does throughout the week. I have her put all the pantry items from the grocery store away, unload her dishes from the dishwasher (she has all plastic dishes), transport laundry to the laundry room, etc. All age-appropriate. I would tie some type of incentive to get them to clean up on their own. It's a great way to build healthy habits, and it's a great opportunity to teach them about money.

[Nanner99]

Originally Posted by nakedbabytoes Well, the dumping stuff is developmental. Toddlers go thru a dumping/gathering stage naturally at 2-3 years. It isn't so much that he doesn't know which car he wants, it's the noise & the action of the dumping itself that is the attraction. If you just can't deal with that, you can provide opportunities to dump/gather by using hard beans in a bin with cans to dump appropriately in a designated area at an appropriate time. So you are still fostering his natural creative developmentally appropriate learning but in a way that you can deal with. Sand, water, beads, beans, anything that is small yet lots of with that tactile & sensory sensation will achieve the same result. Then when he tries to dump inappropriate things like toys or cereal or a flower pot, you can have him help you "gather" clean it up(also natural at that age, take advantage!!), you can then provide him with what is okay to dump/gather. For toy storage, I can't help you much. Every room in our house, with the exception of the kitchen & master bath, looks very much like a child lives here. Not cluttered mind you, everything has it's place. But I have a home daycare, so kids & toys & such are kindof my life at this point. We have areas with toys in almost every room. They get picked up & put in their places at transitional times, but are always "there". The only things we truely get out & put away are messier table items like playdough or crayons or puzzles or pegs or beads & stringers. Those are put up high for safety & only I get them out at specific safe times.

Well put! I used some blackeyed peas for the boys (2 and 3.5) to practice dumping,stirring,etc. But then one of them stuck one up their nose...
I let the boys dump within reason but they can tear there entire room apart- clothes out of drawers and off of hangers and even their*mattress* off the box springs in about 5 min flat. They are getting better about not doing that type of this but I swear, I think it is a combo of gender and them being 16 mos apart- they fuel each other all.day.long.