S/O How many toys do you think is just enough? How many is too few?

[clothlover8]

tub of dress ups
pair of huge batman wings
swords
puzzles around 6
games around 4
full tub of cars - ds loves them!
8 or so trucks
3 baby dolls
cradle
baby carrier
tub of barbies and clothes
shape sorters
some blocks
not many stuffed toys - can't stand them but 5-6 pillowpets
puppet theatre and puppets
some balls - basketball, football, soccer, tennis balls etc
2 small ride on cars
probably 50+ books
30+ colour/craft books bunch of pencils etc
bunch of trains - we don't have tracks oddly??
plastic animals

I know there is more but that's all I can think of/see now.
Wow!! that looks like a lot and I have gotten rid of soooo many. We get given a lot of toys since people know we are a large family and I guess they know we can use them.
Wow this list makes me want to go and purge badly. lol

[clothlover8]

double post

[harmoni247]

I think its harder for me because we do have space for it. We have 1 item per shelf...and weve got completely empty shelves. Ive got platic bins with one item in them. I just went through them yesterday and realized that, so im combining some things and then ill have even more empty shelves. I know we need to because were going back to a smaller house in april, but i think thats why it doesnt seem like so much. Plus i categorize things, so if i only have 3 cars for 3 boys, i feel like im doing good, but thats only because im not thinking of the 2 boats, tractor, helicopter, 7 trains, etc. Im the worst at craft in this way. But when i add all the categories together, im a little freaked out.

We also have the holidays coming, so from us alone, theyre getting new bags filled with nature exploring items, 3 more boardgames, new doll clothes, books, new travel cups, plus little things in their countdown calendar, like little finger puppets, etc. Plus our parents gifts, and they get way more than us!

[harmoni247]

Clothlover, that seems really good for a family of 10! I cant imagine the dynamics of toy play and sharing with so many.

[TalkinBoutMyGirl]

Originally Posted by marliah Anna, one of my sons is the same way! He wants to keep everything. What I have been doing lately is involving him in the process. Talking to him about how nice it is to have space and for everything to have a proper place, and how there is more time to play of we arent always having to clean things and fix things. He has a hard time still but is learning to let things go. Also just yesterday we settled in a we rule, anything new coming into the house can only come in as something else leaves. Well this boy is so silly! He found a small race car track at goodwill and told me he would trade a broken board game for it I didn't know we were holding on to broken things! I'm going to have to look through stuff more carefully. Apparently this game was unusable but he still wanted to keep it. Anyway sometimes it helps to involve them in the process he sometimes encourages me to let go of things I think I need too.

I need to remember this! I have talked to her about giving toys to children who don't have any. That sad, pitiful face just breaks my heart though! I am going to do another purge of her room before Christmas. It seems like we have more "big" stuff and that is really hard to get rid of. Example..her Melissa and Doug kitchen. She NEVER plays with it. Heck she only ever plays in her room if her friends are over. It's just taking up a ton of space but I can't bring myself to get rid of it. There is tons of time left for her to enjoy it and maybe she will start playing with it? Who knows!

[missemily]

We recently moved my older boy upstairs to the 3rd floor bedroom. My 4 year old now has the room to himself. Can you guess who only plays with ONE toy now besides his 'lovie' rabbit. I keep telling DH that we really need to get rid of most the other large things.

[nalazimbala]

I agree with a PP who said you can't have too few. When our family went travelling this year, we were gone for 8 months and all of our 2 kids' toys fit in one child's backpack. Now that we are back home, of course, packed away toys have come creeping back in.

While we were gone, this is what they carried around:

6 small wooden train cars
4-5 beanie baby sized stuffies
3-5 matchbox type cars
3 tiny little fuzzy animals (abt 1" high)
1 crocheted 7-8" doll (made it on the trip for DD)
4-5 silk scarves (for dress up)
colored pencil roll and pad of paper

That was about it. Some of the places we stayed had some toys, but for the most part, it was what was listed above, or ordinary household items/outdoor items that they played with.

[badmisterkitty]

I have one of those cheap 3 drawer plastic containers and all toys MUST fit in there.

That is both awesome and crazy at the same time!! We have one and all that's inside is play food and dishes! The amount of toys we have is embarassing, really, but they play with most of it. I try not to have duplicates of the same kind of toy, like we only have one stuffed animal that's a dog, etc. It's gotten exponentially harder with 3 kids and balancing teaching to share with allowing them to each have their own.

What would you get rid of? I rotate all of this around every few months. Toys is not my strong minimal suit. I do better in other areas, promise.
1 box small legos
1 small tote duplos
Duplo lego table
1 set of small Disney princesses
1 set of big Disney princesses
tote full of large Fisher Price "beads"
tote full of Mr. Potato head
3 puzzles in boxes
5 peg puzzles
felt mail kit
Critter Clinic
maybe a dozen misc board puzzles
shape sorter
ring stacker
small box of misc baby toys (rattles, teethers)
small box of Capital & lowercase letters
Toy guitar
toy piano
play kitchen
tons of dishes & play food (but no food duplicates)
magnetic dress up doll toy
Woodkins X2 + fabric
My Little Pony playset
basket of dress up clothes & items
"gumball" machine with plastic balls
elephant ball popper with a ball stuck in it - so prettymuch useless
pelican pull toy
dog pull toy
tea set
3 baby dolls + a small amount of clothing, bottles, etc
2 baby doll carriers
1 play stroller
1 play cart
8 or so stuffed animals
Dr's set
2 plasma cars
1 bike
1 trike
a dozen? coloring books & 1 box of markers
easel
1 large doodle pro
2 small doodle pros
1 small tub of McD's toys
1 small tub of little people animals
1 set of castle blocks
1 Little People roller coaster play set
a variety of balls
2 baseball gloves
2 different sets of stacking cups
small basket of tub toys
a bunch of lincoln logs

and of course books, a few misc art supplies, stencils, and a small variety of non-toys that have become toys. And outside there is the swing set, wagon, seesaw toy and a bunch of sand toys.

See, it's embarassing.

The sad part is that compared to other people we know, our kids don't have that many toys. Most of our friends have play rooms FULL of toys. I'm not into keeping up with others, but I have a hard time cutting when they play with it all when it's available to them.

[moms5angels]

ill do my best to think of them all. ill go by rooms since its easer for me that way. the bins i use r those small cloth ones. (unless stated other wise)

my oldest sons room:
2 bins of big legos (in there orignal plastic container they come in. not the mega)
1 bin of small legos(same thing. in the orignal container they come in. hes really into legos)
1 bin of cars
1 train table with trains & tracks in the trundle (trains & tracks are going in the boys room. the train table is being thrown out. its old & warn out)
15 books est.

in the boys room:
1 bin of cars & trains
1 bin of legos
2 bins mixed of baby dolls, stuff animalls, & doll supplies (now down to 1)
5 books
2 thomas take a longs
2 small car take a longs.

n r play space in the living/dinning room (its one room)
1 small bin of mixed toys (legos,cars,baby doll & supplies, some toys for the baby)
1 small lego dump truck
1 small lego fire truck
1 vaccume
2 ride ons (my younger 3 all use them)
(not allowed to use the listed items below w/o permission 1st)
14 puzzles (just brought it down to 8.
4 games
1 olds wipes container of learning card games. (need to go through)
1 ice cream bucket for marbles & marble tracks
1 icecream bin of playdow/supplies
12 coloring books (just purged. now were down to 5. one per child.)

my daughter has
1 jumperoo
1 small storage unit of toys (need to go through again)
1 woden bead maze
1 vteck sit to stand dancing tower

for outside
3 bikes (20, 16, 12in)
1 balance bike
1 trike
2 coup cars (the younger 3 use them)
3 scooters
1 huge gray ball (i can take the air out of this for winter storge. takes up lil space)
8 balls in one small bage (soccer, basket ball, reg balls, volly, ect...)
1 beach bag of sand toys (3 buckets, 1 turtle sand toy, 3 shovles. i need to get a few more buckets/shovels)

wow.... looking @ this list i see where i can really purge some more & i thought i didnt have much to perge in this aera. i should do this more often. thanks for the idea!

[Quickshep19]

Good grief we have tooooooo many. My 11 yo is really into legos & video games heck electronics so I don't even mess there. Every few months I blow my top & clean his sty and toss broken stuff & rearrange stuff.

DS2 has entirely too many toys but we alternate. I need several of those tiny totes to put his toys in so we can alternate better. I just can't really minimize him in this area. So frustrating.

Jodie ~ mama to Big K, Medium K & Lil' k