Less is More

So the holidays have come and gone and with that there are so many toys left in the wake of it. My first thought is wow, I'm so grateful that so many people love my kid and have gone out and got these amazing, thoughtful gifts for her, but yikes, all the toys add up and well quite frankly kids (or at least my kid) loves the cheapest, simplest toys. I'm sure you've heard people say that kids like the box the toy comes in better than the toy itself, well that is so true. I think we spent 2 hours Christmas Eve playing in a large Amazon box and had the best time. We colored in it, we played peek-a-boo, we played jack-in-the-box, we turned it into a car.... and the list goes on. And that is just one card board box!

Everyone wants the best for their kid, and lots of people think that the best is something you can go and buy, the most expensive thing, the biggest thing, the newest thing, the best selling thing. But I don't buy into that. I believe less is more. For example, N's favorite tub toys are empty ketchup and salad dressing bottles and Chobani cups. Yes she loves soap bubbles and colored fizzy bath bombs and other fancy things they market for kids tub time, but we always go back to the empty bottles and cups. I'm not sure what that is, but it seems the simpler it is, the more fun it can be.

I also think that having all the new toys, from the holidays, out all at once is a bit overwhelming for them. N just turned 2 and her birthday is 3 days before Christmas, so needless to say, lots of presents were opened over the course of a few days. So we've got toys from before the holidays, birthday toys, holiday toys, and not a whole lot of space left! I'm in the process of cleaning out her closet and putting away her 0-1 year old toys to make room for the new 2 year old toys. And in doing this I decided that I'm going to put away some of the new toys too, just so there aren't so many toys out all at once. When all the toys are out all at once, N tends to play with all of them, bouncing from one to the other every 15-20 minutes. If I put some away and then every now and again we pull one out, its way more exciting and she focuses on that one toy for quite a bit longer. Rotating all the new toys around this way will make them all feel special again when we pull them out. I did this with her 0-1 year old toys. We had maybe 4 toys that were always out and put a majority of them in her closet. Most of the time she played with the 4 toys that were out, but occasionally she'd go into her closet and pull out a 'new' toy and play with that and it was something she could do on her own and be excited about getting out. 

Now putting everything away is another thing all together!