Has anyone successfully completed a toy purge?

[Flossyts]

The mess oh my god the mess.
The kids have so much stuff. And yet I think they get overwhelmed by it and don’t remember what they have and just end up watching telly.
i want to reduce the number of toys they have immediate access to significantly (to about 8/10 toys). The rest will get tossed or go in garage for rotation.
Has anyone done this- I’m struggling to sum up the courage!!!

Yes. We lived in a small house. I never got down to 8 to 10. But I utilised the loft well. Things like happy land would be out for 6 weeks then put away for a few months, we rotated board games and jigsaws, duplo etc I had 3 kids close in age so it helped as well, as sometimes it would be the first time a younger child was 'into' that toy.

I also did second hand sales to get rid of things we no longer wanted/needed. (And often came home with some new toys!)

This is my dream!!! I swear DD2 cuddly toys are reproducing. DD1 shows hoarding tendencies. I want to order a skip.

I’m not convinced it is possible if the kids are over the age of 3. Mine would be traumatised. I think forget NCT, new parents need how to stop the clutter classes.

I’m going with slow reduction but it is never fucking ending. I think trying to reduce what comes into the house is good. PIL can be lovely but they show love through things. But what they buy doesn’t not make up the majority of crap in our house.

I’m keen to hear others answers.

We did this when our kids were small. My DH boxed up a load of their toys and we put them in the loft. That way, if they actually asked for something specific we could get it for them. After 6 months or so, when they hadn't missed any of it, we got rid.
I realise this relies on having enough space to store it out of sight for a period of time.

We used to do a toy purge around November every year, because Father Christmas only brings as many toys as you have room for and if there's no space for new toys in your bedroom you won't get any. That was enough incentive to get DS to help when he was younger. We sorted all toys into 3 piles - keep, store, and give away. Some of the toys stored in the attic would get given to the charity shop later, if he didn't ask for them for a while.

Good luck!

I just accept that the plastic tide will eventually recede but until then we're flooded. Early teens they'll switch to only wanting gadgets and the toys will wander off. Probably about then they'll start leaving mouldy plates around etc.

I have 6, 60l boxes which I rotate. It works well

We store toys by type. So, a box of lego, box of sylvanians, box of cars etc.. They're in a big expedit thing with a limit of two boxes out at a time. There are a few exceptions, cuddly toys live in bedrooms and there's always basic arts crafts stuff and books available.

Anything that doesn't get played with much goes into quarantine in the loft. If nobody asks for it for six months it's off to the charity shop.

I need to do this atm and also struggling with where to start. Both the DC can be quite sentimental about toys they used to play with a lot and with a 3 year gap I'm loathe to get rid of things like books that are too young for DC1 but that DC2 might read later. I'm going to start with things like dressing up clothes that physically don't fit them any more and board games that are too young now they like playing more advanced things. Plus toys that they haven't really played with for a while. I'm aware I am also part of the problem as I get quite sentimental about books etc that I have lovely memories of us reading together when they were little and I'm struggling with letting go of that time with eldest about to start secondary school 🙄

I am getting to the point of not wanting Santa to visit. 9 year old kind of excluded from this, but the 7 and 3 year old now have expectations of toy mountains from Santa which I stupidly set.
I have tried suggesting that we ask Santa for holiday vouchers instead. The 9 year old thinks that’s a brilliant idea but the 7 year old wants more stuff. The 3 year old has no idea what I’m on about.
incidentally it’s my 7 year old girl that causes the most mess (fairly sure she has adhd)

It depends on the age of them. Mine were motivated enough to clear out and sell what they didn’t play with anymore. We sold quite a bit on eBay, Vinted and Facebook marketplace and they got to keep the money minus any fees/postage costs (split it in the case of joint toys.) We’ve also done a car boot and that paid for a family meal out. Otherwise I did it when they were out when they were younger - stuff got quarantined and then moved out!

Yeah! I love it! Every year or so (after a round of birthdays) I’ll go through and things never played with or outgrown go out on a table on the driveway and get snapped up by passers by. If there are any nicer bits I’ll sell them if I can summon the energy, or give away to a specific person for free, again if I can be bothered.

Things not played with but I WANT them to play with are reintroduced and encouraged and accessible.

We rotate big things out of the loft eg Brio train track, toot toot car set (we have a wide age gap and the older ones actually still like playing with these 😄) - things that take up lots of space are a one-in-one-out the loft situation.

We’ve also reconfigured the playroom so toys are more visible and accessible.

Still masses of screen time though!

Edit just saw your age gap - ours are 9, almost 7, and 2.5 so similar 😄 comes with so much stuff!!

The only toy purge we had was accidental. During an international move, the shipping container was dropped and damaged, so all our boxes and furniture had to be put in a new shipping container. The forklift driver then ran over several boxes of toys, obliterating them; including an entire village of Sylvanians homes and all.

We held a memorial service for those “lost at sea” and I let the DC use the insurance money for their lost toys to buy new ones.

Oh my god how awful…….but at the same time I think I would love to start all over again!

I have bought the boxes…… that’s as far as I’ve got 🤦‍♀️

I used to go through the toys when they were at nursery/school and stick a couple of boxes of anything that hadn’t been played with for a long time - they’d be snapped up and never mentioned ever again. Certain things were passed on to other family, sylvanians/brio/lego etc but most of the random playsets and games and stuff went to passing strangers.
There were only so many toys I was willing to put up with 😂

I rotate. There's more than 8-10 out but it's manageable. My kids are only 2 and 3 though so I'm able to take things away and donate them. If the 3yo does happen to remember, I can currently say, "Oh, it'll be around somewhere" or "It must have got broken" (which is quite often true). I will introduce post-Xmas purges in a couple of years and include the kids.

We limit what comes in and try to buy hardly any new toys outside bdays/Xmas and then do want/need/wear/read at bdays and about 10 presents at Xmas which includes clothes, socks, chocolate.

It's not perfect but it's easier than most of my friends have it. You might just have to bite the bullet by starting with broken and missing pieces (but secretly extend it to unused things). Hide them away for a couple of months and then just get rid of them -- hopefully they won't ask for anything.

I’m taking a day off to do this once they are back at school… it’s been such a mess this holiday! I have put a few toys they actually like away now, so I can get them out when I do it to cover the disappearance

*of the ones that make horrendous repetitive noises - that was meant to say!

Do keep some favourites for your potential future grandchildren. My children play with toys that are amazing and so unique when they visit grandma because she kept them from her own childhood as well as her kids. Some of it is over 50 years old.

We used to do toy purgatory (get rid of after six months in storage) but dd has a long memory and will randomly choose a bedtime when everyone is incredibly tired to suddenly remember a cuddly toy or doll she hasn't seen for three years then howl for it.

Also goes for old toys they spot in photos. Ds couldn't be arsed but dd is a person who is attached to Stuff.

We did it yesterday. The playroom was a state and toys kept migrating all over the house.

So we pulled out every toy, throwing away broken ones as we went, and put them into piles -- teddies, dinosaurs etc.

The children then went through each pile in turn and decided what to keep and what to donate.

The amount of old baby toys and perfectly good play sets that aren't touched was astounding.

They reduced their toys by half and are still playing with the same old stuff aka the dinosaurs and the playmobile.

1 bin bag of rubbish and two bin bags of donations.

Yes but then the space mysteriously filled up again.