Toy Minimalism has positively impacted not only my homemaking, but my natural motherhood as well. I don’t label my myself a minimalist but the simple practice of scaling down toys in our home, has made a HUGE difference in our family.
Being inundated with toys, and all the stuff my children have acquired, was the farthest thing from my mind when becoming a new mom. Especially when deciding to be a full time homemaker / stay at home mom. I never realized how keeping track of not only my things, but both my children’s (and usually my husbands too!) would take up such a huge chunk of my work load. Upon discovering minimalism, it completely rewired my brain and helped me to realize a lot of learned materialism that I did not want to hold on to anymore. I had to unlearn so much of it and become aware of the clinging so that I could move forward and not pass that on to my children. It’s easy for kids to have a ton of clothes or shoes (at least for me) but entertainment…that’s another story. Enter toy minimalism.
Why I decided to practice toy minimalism
Constant cleaning: There’s always a point in the week where the toys, movies, books, whatever have made their way all over the floor couches and kitchen chairs. There are already dishes to do at the end of the day and just the rest of the general housework. I don’t need another forty seven things to clean, organize and put away. I clean often enough without having all the of the tiny things that I don’t use or honestly even care about.
Constant rotating: We do a toy rotation about once or twice a month. If you haven’t heard about this, it’s a genius, I think it’s Montessori based, organization that basically just puts half the toys away for a period of time and then rotate out the available toys to keep things new and interesting. I’ve been doing this probably since my now four year old was able to pick out his own toys and it’s a game changer. However, when there are 372 toys to rotate, it all becomes overwhelming and a constant task in itself.
Either buying more/getting more hand me downs: No one should have to keep perpetually buying new toys to keep children happy. If you can, that’s just fine. If you want to, more power to you. But I cannot afford that, for one. Second, I don’t need them to expect that they will forever be receiving toys and gifts no matter what day of the year it is. I’ve told my family what kind of gifts we like. I’ve stopped saying yes to friends or family who always want to donate stuff to us.
Always purging: Too many toys from too many people means that I have to decide what to keep and purge. My kids did not play with all their toys and things. So I always observe what they are most interested in and what hasn’t been touched in months. I seem to always have a donation bag in the closet and put things in there because they lose interest in so many things. And it’s just an infinite process of donating, drop off, intake, repeat. No thank you. No more please.
General maintenance: Batteries, lost pieces, organizing, oh my! Keeping up with so many things requires a lot energy and time. Not to mention, money. Batteries cost money. Replacement parts are money. Tape and glue to repair things, more money. Not a lot initially, but over time it adds up. Being a full time homemaker requires all of your time, energy and focus. All that needs to be managed well, and when children’s entertainment takes up a third of your house, a quarter of your time and a small dent in your wallet, is it really worth it?
Decision paralysis: Kids don’t need fourteen options. Three is my limit when I give them choices. Two is my main number though. When it comes to toys, I don’t want my kids to only have two things. They obviously can have more. Although, when they want to go play having sixty eight choices is overwhelming. And I completely empathize with them, I can’t even figure out which apple to pick out because there are a hundred of them! Imagine what our tiny little ones brains are going through! To spare the some time, I’ll only put out a few toys at a time. And then I can easily rotate those with the other few I have out away.
How toy minimalism helps my homemaking and motherhood
My kids do a lot more imaginative and independent play. They role play airplane pilot, camping, random things like racing with their step stools, and generally play more with what they have. If you’re a parent you can agree it’s sometimes the most random things that they want to play with like cardboard boxes or couch cushions. My toddler doesn’t often ask me to help him get started playing anymore. He still will when it’s certain things like trains or Spider-Man and doc oc (I’m obviously doc oc trying to chase the allusive spiderman). But overall his imagination just lets him run wild.
Letting my kids be bored is a good thing. Sometimes we need boredom to challenge our imagination. Then creative and critical thinking can work it’s wonderful magic! Also, somedays it’s great to simply not do anything. My son started ‘cloud gazing’ out of boredom one day and now he finds pictures and shapes in the textures in our ceiling
Less work for me. This probably should be number one because of course when there are less toys, it’s less overall work for me.
Spending more time outdoors. Since indoors has limited options my kids are (even more) inclined to go outside and dig around in the garden, play on their cars, draw with chalk, or examine the many bugs our backyard inhabits. Whatever it is, they are down for it!
Peaks their interest in other things that aren’t necessarily ‘entertainment’. For example, cleaning , practical life skills, baking, homeschool learning, Bible study, reading, etc. This was really fun for me because then they wanted to help out around the house more and actually do the tiny lessons I made up for my toddler. My oldest even said one day ‘mama, you don’t have to make any decisions, you can just take the day’. Be still my heart!! It was too sweet in his tiny four year old voice. Oh!
Character building and teaching responsibilities. Learning to be accountable for you own things can definitely be a challenge at their age, however it’s definitely attainable. My two year old helps clean up and is understanding where we put things when they get out away. Also, the simple act of putting in a bit of work will pay off in the future. My toddler loves when he knows where his toys are and knows where their ‘home’ is.
Social responsibility. Donating and giving up things we don’t need has been a new lesson we’ve been teaching. Allowing my toddler to know that there are kids in the world without toys, let alone food or clean water, is important so that he can grasp how blessed he is to have what he does. Giving clothes, books, toys to other people who don’t have access or means is something he has actually come to enjoy. When he knows he doesn’t want something he tells me. Ultimately, helping others more vulnerable than us is one of those core values we’d like to instill in our children.
Being an example with my own attachment to stuff. Encouraging our children to see first hand how things aren’t what being happiness. Material wealth is not the main goal and truly not the only type of wealth in this world. Showing them what values are important to us such as family, God, nutrition, wellness, nature, and being good stewards of the earth. We are the first example to our children so we try to be disciplined in being that living example we want to be.
Less stuff, less worries
I’m not saying I have less than ten toys in my home. Maybe I’ll get there one day. But I am on a good path that just keeps becoming clearer. As I continue to minimize toys and figure out what works best for our family. This is a marathon for us and toy minimalism will eventually phase it self out because as our kids grow they’re not going to want many toys anyway as they find what they are most interested in. It’s certainly a season of small children in our house!
Since they don’t have as much to clean, they are more inclined to clean up and easily throw it all back into a universal toy basket. A tule of thumb for my kids is ‘if it’s too much to clean up, then we probably don’t need to play with it’. Giving me less work to do, less things to keep up with and ultimately less stress at the end of the day.
We are moving soon as well and I always take moving as an excellent opportunity to heavily downsize. Our family’s moved only once so far, but there is more in our future. And every time we move, our stuff becomes less and less. Since we will be changing homes more frequently, having less things as an entire family will make packing and settling back in much simpler.
Ethical places to donate
Giving our stuff to others, especially for free, is a much better way to ‘declutter’ our home. For us at least. I don’t have to worry about selling, or holding on to anything until the yard sale. Eco anxiety won’t riddle my thoughts because I’m keeping things out of the landfill as best I can. Here are some places to help with get starting in donating and beginning your own toy minimalism.
- Give Back Box
- local shelters
- Retold Recycling
- little free library
- toy swaps with friends
- local boys and girls clubs
- schools
- local ymca
- hospitals
- day cares
- buy nothing groups
Now, most of these places do require a bit of further research, just a phone call will do to see what their needs are!
There are always thrift stores as an option in most places. So worst case scenario donations could be taken there.
A main take away from toy minimalism is, if you’ve read some of my other minimalism posts (here and here) is intention. When I do decide to bring new toys or just any other general things into our home I ask how long will this last here? Will both my children enjoy this? Is this something that will be able to have another home afterward or is this its last life? How can I maintain this item to make it last longer? And finally, is this a quality item that we all will enjoy in our home? There usually are more questions pertaining to budget and manufacturing too, but I won’t bore everyone with all of those tangents!
It may be a lot to think about, but for me, that’s the whole point. To consciously think before buying ANYTHING. Not to blindly consume at every whim and impulse. We are not mindless consumers in our home, and we’ve worked very diligently to be that.
What have you worked diligently toward? Has it been material or more on the spiritual side? Those are some fun topics I’d love to dive deeper in with you!
In gratitude,
Tayler
