May 2020
Are you a parent of young children? Do you tuck a child in a night hoping to leave the room without stubbing your toe or twisting an ankle on the cascade of toys, books, and trinkets falling off of bookshelves onto the floor? If so, you are not alone. I'm prominently raising my hand as part of this group.
For many the Pandemic of 2020 has given them plenty of time to sort, organize and purge items from every corner of their home. While I love this idea, copious amounts of free time allude me for now. But here and there, I purge. A little one day, more the next. Purging my own items is easy, I do not have attachments to a lot of stuff (books are my exception). When it comes to my kids, it's a different story.
Me asking a child: "Look at this toy dinosaur, ready to pass this along to a littler kid?", and all of a sudden my child drops what s/he was doing, scoops up the toy and says "oh, I forgot about you Dino! No, we can't give this away!!!!" I've found that instead of saying "let's give this shirt away" the question "shall we give this shirt to William?" is more than likely met with concurrence by my child. Passing on an item to a friend, or a specific organization focused on helping children helps them say good-bye to a long forgotten toy or outgrown clothing item.
For those with really little kids, you may enjoy reading Bye-Bye Toys: A story about giving written by Anisha Mack Blumenberg (who is also a Wisconsinite). It is a very simple book you can read with a child to nudge them towards giving items to a new baby. I'll admit the giving away for a teddy bear made both my kids and myself quiver a bit - stuffies for them are more than toys, and we'll hold on to them until my children are old enough to firmly say good-bye. That might not be until High School or College.
Best of luck. And may you not step on too many stray Legos in your quest to purge children's toys.
