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Original poster

DS ruining presents already!

57 replies

Blondie1993 · 28/12/2018 21:28

I am so annoyed and disappointed in DS(7). His birthday was just a few weeks before Christmas and he got everything he wanted and more between myself and family members. He asked for specific playmobil sets which he got plus extras. He got pretty big playmobil sets last year and he didn’t look after them - took half of them apart, didn’t put them back together then basically lost most of the bits and bobs for them. I made it very clear to him this time before he got them, when he opened them, when we built them ect that he must take care of them and keep all the bits together. He went to his dads on Christmas afternoon and came back this afternoon. So in less than a few hours of playing with them spread across Christmas Day and today he has lost half the animals and half the people. Our house isn’t messy, he has no idea where he put them and I can’t find them at all.

I don’t know if I am being unreasonable or not but I am so bloody annoyed with him right now, I feel like telling him he’s not allowed to play with any of his new toys until he finds them!

OP posts:
Alonglongway · 28/12/2018 22:18

Yeah let him play as he wants. My DDs were huge playmobil fans - mixed up the sets, had a massive line of figures along the edge of the bath. They are young adults now and we’ve just been away for Christmas and they were both talking with great pleasure about their playmobil days

IceRebel · 28/12/2018 22:19

You could do what an acquaintance of mine did. Having spent hundreds of £s on big Lego sets ( think Star Wars millennium falcon size) he decided to glue them together

I would take great pleasure in telling said acquaintance that their actions have seriously reduced the cost of the Lego. It's much easier to sell a part complete Lego set, (which he child has played with and lost bits) than it is to sell a glued together set. Trust me glue is not a good thing in the AFOL world.

tillytrotter1 · 28/12/2018 22:24

My grandson, 7 in January, seems to be a little star, he has tons of lego, shares in v-tech etc etc and he keeps it all very orderly, once he's done playing with a piece it's put back where it should be. Ditto his sister, she has been mad about those tiny beads that are hammered onto a board, Hamas(?), and again she keeps those very orderly, she's now 11 so she's been getting those for about 5 years. It can be done but I would agree that it's rare!

KurriKurri · 28/12/2018 22:31

If he has lost a whole pride of lions, I would suggest he was playing some lion based game set them up or took them all somewhere and has forgotten what he was doing rather than actually losing them,

When my DS was little my (then) Dh gave him some toys from his own childhood - they were all perfect - still in their boxes, basically my Xh didn't play with his toys because he'd have got into trouble for spoiling them. I found that quite sad.

Playmobil is a brilliant imaginative toy - with a lot of little fiddly bits. My DS loved it as a child, but he used to eat (yes eat!) the little cannon balls from the pirate ship. I had a chat with him about how to look after it and not consume the small parts or it would be spoilt and he wouldn't enjoy playing with it as much - I let him come up with ideas as to how he could both look after it and enjoy it - we ended up with a plastic set of drawers, animals in one drawer, people in another, weapons etc in anothe and another for odds and sods (clip on hair, tiny hats etc etc) and he could then put all the bits away easily when he;d finished. But he had it set up a lot of the time in an area of his bedroom set aside for playmo.

Of course the inevitable happened and he got into Lego as well so I spent a lot of years extracting tiny bits of sharp plastic from my feet, but he's 34 now and he still remembers fondly how much he enjoyed playing with his playmo and lego. Toy's are of playing with first and foremost, but having a basic level of organization improves enjoyment and reduces frustration when you can't find parts. It is finding the right balance between fun and necessary tidyness.

Original poster
Blondie1993 · 28/12/2018 22:37

So the general consensus is that DS is right and I am wrong. I am very glad he doesn’t get on the internet 😂. He doesn’t really care that there’s anything missing so I guess I will leave him to it! Who knew tiny lions could annoy me so much Blush. He has 5 Lego sets he got for Christmas that he wants to build this weekend too, this must be why wine was invented Wine!

OP posts:
DogMamma · 28/12/2018 22:40

He is a 7 year old child... say no more.

LilQueenie · 28/12/2018 22:41

Its impossible to keep those things in order. Some pieces are so tiny. If he already lost a lot of the previous sets why get more?

Myimaginarycathasfleas · 28/12/2018 22:42

Don’t ever buy him any lego sets of this upsets you Grin

Haha, this!

We spent FORTUNES on Lego Technic for DS, only to see it scattered randomly all over his bedroom floor. Which was carpeted in pale grey jumbo cord Shock

Life, specifically your life, is too short to fret about lost Playmobil.

BabySharkAteMyHamster · 28/12/2018 22:42

My friend made a table like this with buckets and rails on 3 sides of the table. It was a real gamechanger........if you arent providing him.with decent storage you can't moan really.

DS ruining presents already!
sazzle27 · 28/12/2018 22:47

Good luck with the lego OP! DP and I bought his DS and DD lego for christmas..

His DS got some last year too, but his only interest really was with the lego people not the other bits of the sets (batman and batcar, and cheap wilko-lego-rip-off dragons)..

The understanding was that this year he actually had to help build the cars and other bits from the sets rather than nick the people and screw the rest..

Give him his due - he did help build most of it (nearly 7 so not too young to be doing most of it with some help), but after building it and having the people he hasnt touched the hulk cars since!

DPs DD was worse than we expected - loved playing with bricks and wanting to build a hotel so DP bought her a lego hotel set.... barely touched it!

Wish DP had bought me a proper lego set - id have been sat building it and probably playing too by now 😅😅

DPs DS takes all the lego people apart as well - heads, arms, trousers, hands... you name it, it gets swapped. Or not, and we just find hands here and there.. armless bodies in boxes...
I dread to think whats down the side of the sofa as well, and behind the radiator - he just doesnt learn chooses not to listen and then complains that safest place is the floor or table, not sofa arm or on the radiator HmmHmm

Frouby · 28/12/2018 22:48

I have spent since Christmas day looking fir Owens gun. That's Owen from Jurassic World lego. The gun is about the size of a fingernail clipping.

Its all getting taken upstairs tomorrow. Am tempted to superglue Owens bastarding gun to his little legoy hand if the fucker cant keep hold of it.

Yanbu because stuff like this drives me fucking bananas. But we are BU because my ds is 5 and yours is 6 and they are so little still. Superglue it all together or live with the pain.

CheshireChat · 28/12/2018 22:52

Actually all you need to do is chuck the small pieces inside the big sets.

You have my sympathies though, before I wanted to vac today I ended up on my hands and knees looking for tiny playmobil bits on the floor with DS. Little bloody grey guns (and their thrice damned holsters) on our grey carpets!

This is why I'm fond of some shopkins bits, they're colourful!

5foot5 · 28/12/2018 22:52

Yeah sounds like my DD at that age.

Sometimes I despaired at the mess in her room when the Playmobil people would be all mixed up with the Lego figures and the dolls house family and the Polly's and the Sylvanians etc. But actually it was all part of great imaginary play. There was always some story or scene she was acting out. Keeping the toys all neat and separate would probably be less fun and a bit sticking,

frogsbreath · 28/12/2018 22:55

I spent 20 minutes looking for Lego Thor's hair today and I know it'll be lost again. Very tempted myself to unleash the Kraggle and glue his Lego sets together but ds does love mixing all the sets and making new things.

I just need to remember it's not only my kid, and thankfully he never got into playmobil (anyone want £200 of dust laden imaginext?)

Goldmandra · 28/12/2018 22:56

Playmobil and Lego are toys. The intention of toys is that they are played with. Play, by definition, is individual to the child and follows their interests and thought patterns.

If you want your DS to benefit from his play experiences, you need to back off and let him do it his way. If that means putting the Playmobil pirate in the Brio train with a Duplo lion and a Lego Darthvader, it will make sense to him in terms of his imagination and the concepts he is exploring and consolidating.

Please, please don't be a parent who has rules about playing. It is the child's work in which they are the experts and any input from us should be supportive, not controlling.

If you don't let children play freely with their Playmobil, you may aw well glue the sets together and use them as ornaments for all the good they will do.

Lifecanbeabeach2 · 28/12/2018 22:56

Ahh we don’t have an issue with the playmobil I made a playmobil city under daughters bed ( mid sleeper ) the big sets are laid out etc and then I have a small tub/ drawers under there for the small pieces now they don’t always stay in the right sets haha and there is often odd pieces from the house in the hospital etc but it all kept under the bed at all times and then I spend about 10 minutes picking up little pieces at night from under bed to put back in relevant place.

Lifecanbeabeach2 · 28/12/2018 22:57

I should add she plays with her hatchimals / Lego people etc in the playmobil sets too 😂
Everything lives in the playmobil
City !

CheshireChat · 28/12/2018 22:59

But isn't there a middle ground between thrashing toys and very prescriptive play?

So no to being destructive, but yes to, well, playing.

5foot5 · 28/12/2018 22:59

Wish DP had bought me a proper lego set - id have been sat building it and probably playing too by now

@sazzle27 DH did buy me a Lego set. A f* off great big Lego set. The biggest I have ever seen. It is Tower Bridge and has over 4000 pieces. I have been working on it for the last two days but am probably only a quarter of the way through. It is GREAT. I am having such fun! Grin

Goldmandra · 28/12/2018 23:05

So no to being destructive, but yes to, well, playing.

The OP's DS hasn't destroyed anything. He just isn't keeping the toys in the original sets and keeping track of all the pieces.

CheshireChat · 28/12/2018 23:20

Goldmandra See, losing them is being pretty careless in my book.

Mixing the sets up is absolutely normal though, the pirates were first sent to prison, then reformed and turned police officers in our case Grin.

TornFromTheInside · 28/12/2018 23:21

Get tubs for it... and expect to find down the side of the sofa, or under it etc.
Be careful with the vacuum too, as some of the bits are easily sucked up and lost. A pair of tights over the end of the vacuum suction tube can come in handy for gathering it!

The biggest danger is when sending him outside of the home with it. In that situation, stick to the simpler kits with less parts - so it's easier to gather.

waterrat · 28/12/2018 23:27

One of the Playmobil sets we got this Christmas included a mouse and an apple. I have been anxiously picking them up and fitting them back into small bags.

I do think there is a middle ground - it's bad for kids to think you can just lose expensive toys and not care where they are. I can be sure if it was the only toy they got they would take better care of it.

I think at six or seven though they need a lot of adult help keeping things tidy

steff13 · 28/12/2018 23:36

Maybe the lions went off hunting. Look near the zebras.

SleepingStandingUp · 28/12/2018 23:42

I suspect Dad's house...

But yeah, he's playing imaginatively. Lions can't stay by the set, thry need to hunt for Zebra in the washing basket savannahs or in the bath ocean or atop the sofa mountain..