Hellobee Boards

Following because we have the same problem. It feels like there is just toys throwing up all over our house!

I keep what is getting the most play, so for us that's Duplos, Brio train set, puzzles and toy cars. Additionally things that I feel that are good to have around like building blocks, stacking rings etc. Everything else get put away. I notice that they tend to play a lot more with their toys when there aren't so many around.

I don't really have hard and fast rules, but this is what I do. Every so often I go through the playroom and take all the toys that haven't gotten any use in a while. I put them all in a big bin. Every so often when DS gets bored I pull things back out of it (or he finds it and takes stuff, lol). Sometimes it gets played with, sometimes there's no interest. If the toy seems to be too young for him, I put it in a separate bin of baby toys. If the toy just isn't interesting, I get rid of it.

I think how many and what type really depends on how your LO uses them and how much space you have. Do you have younger kids you're passing things down to? If not, I'd just go through and clear out all the toys you dislike or have no interest any more. What's there will seem more appealing when there's less clutter.

We get 8" plastic cube bins from the dollar store and have one "kind" of toy in those bins. So play food, cars, board books, puzzles, etc. Things like books we rotate every two weeks or so. We keep a larger bin of building/STEM type things like wooden blocks, Magnatiles, Mega Blocks. Another big bin is a more generic toy bin with things like musical toys and soft toys and things like balls. We keep large gross motor things mostly on the patio. We keep a table with a Little People's road set that DS uses to play with cars, so sort of like a train table type thing.

That's about it and even that is plenty. DS has literally played with the same bath toys for over a year so I know he can be perfectly happy with fewer toys. We keep toys to rotate in his closet and purge/dump other things all the time. Luckily we have another baby coming so I can save some for him, but if I didn't they'd be gone right away!

I would start by pulling out anything that gets a lot of play. Those I'd keep for sure. Then first I'd purge the cheap stuff. If it looks like it came out of a happy meal, it's not worth keeping unless it's a favorite.

From there I would figure out which toys were the most closed-ended and eliminate those. For example, if I was choosing between a princess dress and a big pretty scarf, I'd keep the scarf. It can be used as a dress, as a blanket, as an accessory, to build a tent, and so on. A dress is a dress and that's about it.

I'd also eliminate anything that encouraged passive play. So in this case, if I was choosing between an electronic toy that played music when you hit a button, and a xylophone, I'd keep the xylophone because you have to actively make the music yourself, not just sit and be entertained.

Any toys that they were about to grow out of would be eliminated as well.

And then when I was done, I'd divide the remaining toys into three sets, and put two in the closet (or somewhere similar) so that they could be rotated. I already rotate LO's toys at 10 months and it's definitely been a good thing.