To be overwhelmed with toys in a small house?

[MooseBreath]

My house has a small living area. The main floor has a kitchen/diner and a living room, but no other living space in the house. Bedrooms are small, so not great for play. We therefore have to share the living space with our children (nearly 3 and 6 months). Obviously kids that age come with a lot of stuff and our living room currently contains a bouncy chair, a jumperoo, hanging toys, a toy storage unit with 3 boxes, and an ottoman toy box, plus all the things in a normal living room (sofa, chair, coffee table, sideboard, TV unit, TV).

On loads of forums and parenting articles, people suggest that parents rotate children's toys so that it's not the same stuff every day. Our space is limited in our house, so I thought this would work really well for us.

But DS (nearly 3) refuses to have the toys rotated! If I put any in storage, he immediately asks (politely, in fairness) for the exact toys I have put away. But he then adds the recently rotated-in toys to his play and I can't cycle the new ones back! He knows every single toy he owns and plays with all of them together Toy Story style. But this leaves our house in such a state and I can't get on top of it.

AIBU to be pulling my hair out? I'm not from the UK and the standard in my home country is a separate playroom or basement, plus a bigger footprint for houses. How do you all keep a house reasonably tidy with children?!

OP I feel you. I have a 7mo and feel the same way...within current view I've got a bouncer, a play mat, a bumbo seat, a tonne of toys and books as well.
I bought a nice basket to contain the toys last week but it's completely full, no room to add anything else. I know some elements - like the bouncer etc - are temporary but I know new things will come in to replace it.
It's tough to feel so cluttered all the time and especially difficult when people keep giving you more and more without really understanding how limited space is.

This made me laugh sorry

The baby crap will go soon enough. With the other toys, I’d try to stop them at the source a bit - tell GPs that you simply don’t have the space and that Name is happily engaged with what he has, and that you can offer some other ideas for gifts if they’d like.

And I’d quietly give away anything that isn’t played with, once your second has outgrown it (assuming the obvious).

the lego playmat/ storage bag is a game changer, lays out flat in a big circle, drawstring closure. Means they can have things exactly as they left them too

The bouncer and jumperoo are ones I couldn’t wait to get rid of! There’s not much you can do about them. The toys, we have a large wicker trunk in the living that contains most, we separate into smaller plastic tubs inside so we know where to find stuff. Rather than it being a huge mess in there!
have trofast and tall Kallax (that takes up little floor space but can fit a lot into those boxes) in the bedroom again, categorise everything and everything feels a little lighter.

I don't know anyone with a sideboard. What's in it? Can it be repurposed as toy storage? In the day accept the mess and tidy it away with the kids before bed every day. Store as much as possible in their room.

The sideboard is an inherited piece of furniture from DH's great-grandparents. We already use it for storage (alcohol/glasses, shoes, toiletries, and cleaning supplies).

I wonder if there's space in the rest of the house to have storage for toiletries, shoes, cleaning products? There's an art to living in a small space! You can't bring in bulk buys, you need storage wherever you can build it ( e.g. up high rather than horizontal, in the kick board in the kitchen, under all beds, buy sofas which fit storage under. I've seen houses look chaotic when people used to big houses are still learning those hacks.

Meant to add, trunk rather than coffee table. That's how we managed with the toys. Maximised storage in the house as a whole. The lounge was a playroom in the day and more adult space at night.

How sensible is the 3yo? Would a cabin bed or mid sleeper be an option? We moved DCs into an Ikea Kura mid sleeper bed (with the tent bit over the top to further reduce the chance of them enthusiastically throwing themselves over the side) at a similar age. It is earlier than is recommended, but neither child was a liability and we needed the space gained. The space underneath was then used as a play area with all their Sylvanian Families permanently set up like a little village (6yo DD2 still has this, although has now upgraded to a Stompa mid sleeper with fabric wendy house panels enclosing the play area).

I would say that 3yo is very clever academically, but far too impulsive for a high-up bed at this stage... I can picture him launching himself (and the dog) off the top just because he could. Maybe next year!

We had a house full of toys when they were that age. Untouched toys.
just get rid of them!

all the toys you can think of and the played with a yogurt pot and spoon. Or a tennis ball sized ball.

they did like the train set in short bursts.

I think the children get as overwhelmed as the parents & it’s just in the way!

We always rotated the toys when mine were small. We had a very small house and room for 1 trofast storage unit in the lounge and no space in the bedroom (the kids shared a room that hardly fit their shorty bunk beds let alone any storage) we had a big shed in the garden with more trofast units to fit the rest of their toys and they were allowed whichever combination of boxes they wanted as long as it fit the storage unit indoors. The rest was in the shed. I might remove a box of they didn't play with it much for a while and swap it or bring in something they asked for.