Had I thought, I would have taken before and after pictures of this room. However, I didn't have the foresight to see this purging/organizing effort as a blog post, so all I have are the "after" pictures.
Welcome to my children's playroom. Please note, that I only have two incredibly spoiled children, I do not run a daycare (though we definitely have enough toys in our house to do so). Prior to December 2012, this room served as our guest room. After Christmas last year, we removed the "real" furniture, and moved the majority of the kid's toys to this room. It served to clear the toy clutter from the living room, and concentrated most of the toy mess to this one area of our house. At that time, we purchased the cloth bins and sorted the toys by category into the bins.
There are two bins filled with playdoh and playdoh accessories. There are two bins filled with various cars and trucks. A bin full of coloring books and crayons, another bin that holds play dishes and plastic food. A bin filled with little animals, a bin filled with Little People and their accessories, and a bin that holds various bottles, diapers, and other items for my daughter's dolls. Tucked underneath the train/lego table are three plastic bins full of legos. The toy box (which you can't see in the pictures) holds all the random toys that don't fit into one of the binned categories.
Organization of this room has been an ongoing battle for us. It seems that every time we get this room organized, someone has a birthday, and another influx of toys takes over. Last weeks purge resulted in a stack of items to be recycled, a trash bag full of broken toys to be disposed of, and another trash bag of toys that my children have either outgrown, or simply don't play with, to be given away.
The huge difficulty in cutting back on the amount of toys in our house comes from the fact that I can't seem to find time when my children aren't home to go through their toys without them. In their minds EVERY toy in our house is their FAVORITE toy, despite the fact that they haven't played with it in months or even years.
As discretely as possible, I removed the two-plus trash bags full of toys from the room. I could easily remove an equal amount again if my children hadn't been present.
Unfortunately, even though there are a ton of toys in this room, there are still toys in other areas of our house. At present, the kids share a bedroom, and that too is over run with even more toys. There are still toys in our living room, and the outdoor toys are stored in the garage. My goal, is to continue to pare down the amount of toys that they have to a more manageable amount.
As their interests become more defined, I'm trying to remove those items that are no longer used, and focus their toys more around their interests. My daughter's interests are primarily focused on her dolls at this time, as well as craft projects. My son's interests are primarily focused on cars/trucks, and the Fisher Price Little People.
I'm quite resigned to the fact that battling the amount of toys in our house will be a never-ending process until their teen years, but until that time I'll continue to wage war on the toy clutter!
