This toy has always been one of her very favorites.
It was the "stay sane on a long car ride toy" at one point.
Then it got ignored.
A few months ago, I started rotating Eva's toys.
I put a ton of her toys away - out of sight and out of mind.
I separated her toys into similar things.
Big toys, toys that sing, stuffed toys, puzzles, blocks - all in separate piles.
Then I put about 2/3rds of each pile away.
Only one or two things from each pile stayed - the rest were hidden away.
I was hard core.
Some of her very favorites went into the closet.
It has worked great.
When I see she is getting bored with toys - about once every week or so...
I swap out her toys.
On this day I swapped...
she sat still for 30 minutes playing with her once favorite toy.
The entire kitchen was cleaned and dinner finished.
Have you tried rotating toys?
10 comments:
We do that at work and it works brilliantly. It's like reconnecting with an old friend!
We have week day toys because Will only gets an hour with them each night, and then we have weekend toys that he is reunited with on Saturday and Sunday. Sounds like the rotating is really working, especially with 30 minutes spent with one toy!
No, but I am so gonna try this. You have the best ideas! Rotating toys, & not using paper towels...you rock hardcore mama!
So we haven't completely implemented the no paper, but I am going to stock up on some good hand towels, when I find a good sale. Target didn't have any in their one bin.
I rotate every 2-3 weeks, it's AMAZING!!
I haven't tried this, but I like that my kids might sit still and play quietly for 30 minutes! Thanks for the idea :)
that sounds like an awesome method...we haven't tried that...but just might have to! Love the one sock!
even veteran preschool teachers know the wisdom of swapping toys around. not that i am a veteran, but I used to teach. We do this at home and it's amazing how exciting old toys can be!
So smart. We also never let EJ open his birthday/holiday gifts all at once. We pick a few for him to have. Everything else gets put away in a closet for another time. If he had all 15 new toys at one time he would get bored with all new toys at one time. I think I am going to spend the afternoon rotating toys. Good idea.
I have always wanted to do that. Even with their ages so spread out they all still want to play with the same things.
You've given me the inspiration to try it this week. Thank you!
We haven't done toy rotation around here, but it's definitely something that is coming. Little Man has SO MUCH stuff (his grandparents live 5400 miles away, so they like to send boxes of toys out here to us). He has a few things that he plays with all the time. Sometimes I think we could get rid of everything else and he'd be content.
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