How do I tidy DD's room while being helped by 15mo DS?

[piprabbit]

DD is 5yo and her room is a black hole attracting every tiny piece of pink plastic tat within miles.
She's really not capable of tidying effectively on her own yet (has a good go, but is slow and gets distracted), so I like to give her a hand.

but my 15mo DS is cramping my style. He climbs everything, puts everything in his mouth (causing me a succession of choking panics) and thinks that DDs room is heaven on earth. If I shut DDs door, he howls as he hates to be left out - but if the door is open he simply comes in and creates even more chaos.

Please can I have your ideas for how I can get into DDs room to tidy? At the moment I have to use some of my precious baby sitting sessions to get my housework done, but I really want to learn how to combine caring for DS with actually tidying.

does he sleep during the day?

Could you use something like a stairgate to make a barrier that you can still see and talk to him through? and maybe give him a drawerful of DDs socks or suchlike to 'sort out' so he's 'helping' and involved.

For an hour - just not enough time for me to get all my chores done . I do what I can but barely keep on top of things.

well I would probably get all of you in there (if there is room) and give him a box of safe pink stuff whilst you try and deal with another area of the room.

It is frustrating I know, I used to find it occupied the DCs quite nicely to turn out the toy box and get to all the forgotten things at the bottom. It might take you days to get throught it all but it can be done.

Grimma - I like the stairgate idea, it might just work. That's why I like MN - a little inspiration.

Perdu - DDs room is not large, I've tried that one and found that he was simply emptying drawers on the floor while eating some tiny horseshoes. He's always more interested in what other people are doing instead of occupying himself. Maybe he'll grow out of some of the more dangerous things and make things easier - if I can wait that long.

Many thanks to you both.

Do you have a DP? I find the only way of getting things done is to get DH to take DD to the park or something.