Raising A Family

There have been many times that I’ve entered my kids rooms and found a huge mess of toys all over the floor. It’s taken literally hours to sort through everything and get it cleaned up. A lot of times this happens when we have company over and all of the toys are just too tempting to leave up on a shelf. If you find your self buried under your kids toys way too often these ideas for keeping the toy room clean may help.

• Keep an eye on the kids: It’s so tempting to let your child play with the door closed for hours on end while you get things done, but in most cases this often leads to disasters as far as the toys go. If you find yourself in a situation where your child wants to be alone with the toys just make it a habit to check on them every 10 minutes or so. As I have learned from experience silence is not always golden when it comes to kids. Checking on them often will make sure they are safe, out of trouble, and will give you a chance to do a visual check of what toys are out and what might need to put away.
• Make a rule to take one toy out at a time: I learned this from my mother after watching her with the daycare she runs. She trains those kids from almost the minute they can play with toys to pick up one thing before they move to the next. Even with toddlers it can be done. They will need your help at first, but soon enough they will catch on and be able to do it on their own.
• Try to keep games and toys that contain lots of pieces on higher shelves. I try to keep all the toys I want to regulate on high shelves so that my younger kids have to ask to get them down. This allows me to check their room to make sure everything is picked up before we get down something that could get mixed up easily.
• If possible make the toy box only a storage for things that are quick to pick up. I have never been a fan of a toy box until my daughter was born and I needed a place to store her “babies” and stuff animals. Things can get lost in the never ending pit of a toy box so be careful what goes in them. They also seem to hold a lot so depending on what’s in them, if your child empties the toy box you could be in for some trouble.
• Make sure everything has a place. If your child has a place for each of their things it will be so much easier to put them away. I know as an adult it’s much easier to clean when I don’t have to find places for things as I put them away.
• If you have a party or company over, pack up or hide any toys that may create a large clean up job afterwards. You may also want to explain to the children which toys are even which rooms are off limits for the day. Sometimes the toy room becomes the hardest room to clean up afterwards if it’s left as a “free for all”.
• Each night before bed do a quick clean up in the toy room. If you have followed the advice above it shouldn’t take more than a few minutes. It’s never fun to start the morning with a messy place to play.
• Encourage your kids to keep their toy room clean by using positive statements. Sing a clean up song as you work and let them know what a good job they do to keep their toys picked up. Ask them how they feel when the room is clean and let them know you like it too. My husband does a great job of praising our kids when he sees a clean room. I makes them feel good and want to try hard to keep it clean.

Try not to get discouraged if you have a bad day and the room is a disaster. I don’t think there are many kids that have a perfectly clean room 365 days of the year.