How to manage tiny toys around a toddler

[Mamabear04]

DD is 4 years old and now is given toys with tiny parts ie playmobil etc. I also have a 16m old and I'm struggling to know how to manage the tiny toy parts so that DS doesn't accidentally choke but that DD still gets to play with her toys.

Just for context, we don't have a huge house and all of the kids toys tend to be accessible in their rooms. DD wont play in her room by herself and even if she did we don't have any space for her to safely leave her toys out. If she plays in her room then DS and I are usually there too (DS finds his big sisters room much more exciting and won't bother paying in his own room). DH also works from home most of the time at our kitchen table so can't have toys there (plus don't want tantrums about having to tidy up for meals). Any ideas in how to manage this?

When my youngest was a toddler we just didn't leave stuff out. Everything had its own box, the boxes with baby safe toys on lower shelves & small parts toys on higher shelves, which came out when toddler had naps.

Presumably the older ones in school most of the day, so older toys don't need to be out then. After School there's only a couple of hours before your DH finishes working (again just a guess), so once he's done, one of you can play with the toddler while the other supervises 4yo in different rooms.

My sister has a similar age gap. Toys with small parts are only allowed out on a table, not the floor, or when the younger one is napping.

@Sprogonthetyne DD has only just turned 4 so is in nursery 3 afternoons. So we have mornings together during the week and then 1 full day together. I guess you make it sound so simple. I think the problem is DD wants me to play with her and I can't sit at the table with DS and play with all these tiny toys. DS will beg to sit up on my knee and wants to be involved in everything his big sister does. I never managed to get ontop of toy management so maybe I need to stop avoiding it and this will be my solution. Any tips for storage/keeping toys separate? I just have those ikea box style book shelves and all the toys just flung in the boxes. I've tried to keep it organised but DH just treats it like a toy bin!

Just suggest a baby safe toy & play that with them both. They'll care more about having your attention then what the game is. Duplo, kid kenex, train set or animal/dinosaur figures seem to hold attention for older ones, without small parts. Sometimes you do have to say no if the older one wants something out, but you can promise to do it with them during the toddlers nap and big it up as a special 1:1 time, big kid game.

We have kallax units in the kids rooms. We use the big boxes for bigger toys or stuff we have a lot of. We also have the extra shelf insert for some cubes, which splits the bigger cube in half, then have 4 smaller boxes in place of one big box.

We were keeping lego separately (high up) for a while but tbh by 16m we'd relaxed a bit and don't attempt to keep anything separate now. Mainly because the toddler is less interested in putting small things in her mouth, and less likely to accidentally swallow.