Momma’s Guide To Reducing Toy Clutter

Are you tired of stepping on wooden blocks and plastic action figures lying around your living room floor? Reducing toy clutter is really about more than keeping your home neat. Too many playthings can affect your child’s development and their ability to enjoy life.

A recent study found that children with too many toys get distracted easily and miss out on quality playtime, according to the University of Toledo in Ohio.

The research confirms what many parents and experts have long noticed. When children have fewer choices, they tend to play with each object longer and express more creativity. They even take better care of their toys instead of assuming that a replacement is on hand.

Learn how to conquer those mountains of dolls and dinosaurs. You’ll make playtime more rewarding and teach your children values that will help them to grow up happier and more successful.

Getting Rid of Old Toy Clutter:

1. Focus on quality. Be selective about the toys you choose to keep. Discard anything your children have outgrown or broken. Hold on to the ones that stimulate your child’s imagination and social skills rather than providing mostly passive entertainment.
2. Wait until bedtime. It’s great if your child is ready to participate in the selection process, but until then you might have to act on your own. Your child will probably not even notice they’re missing a stuffed animal they haven’t touched in years.
3. Rotate your collection. One effective strategy is to keep out only a portion of your child’s toys at any time and store the rest. Everything will seem new each time you switch them out.
4. Display your treasures. Arrange toys in a logical order in small stations with individual themes. Your child will spend more time playing and less time dumping bins out onto the floor to check what’s on the bottom.
5. Share the profits. How can you motivate your child to winnow down their toys on their own? Ask for their help selling the rejects online or at a garage sale. Give them a portion of the proceeds or put the money towards an outing or some new sports equipment that they want.
6. Swap with friends. Consider setting up an exchange with other parents in your neighborhood or at your child’s school. Box up toys you’re discarding or storing and give them away permanently or temporarily.
7. Donate to charities. Decluttering can also teach your child about giving. Create a list of worthy causes that accept used toys and let your child pick which one to support.

Preventing New Toy Clutter:

1. Plan for special occasions. Birthdays and holidays could undo all your hard work. Find out what your child wants most. Make a short list and stick to it.
2. Advise the grandparents. Do you have well-meaning family and friends who add to the mess? Let them know that you’re trying to reduce your consumption.
3. Test it out. It’s easier to say goodbye to a video game or science kit when your child knows it’s just visiting. You can subscribe to monthly toy rental services online or check to see what your local library has to offer.
4. Favor experiences. Consider arranging activities instead of giving material goods. Take your children to concerts and horse farms to celebrate birthdays or outstanding report cards.
5. Encourage reading. Giving your child a love for reading may be the most enriching gift of all. A library card takes up very little space.

Cutting down on incoming toys and thinning out your child’s current stock will help your child to engage in more constructive and creative play. Your whole family will also enjoy a tidier home and less stress.

Do you know the effects helicopter parenting is having on your family?

Rather than protecting your children, this intrusive behavior can limit your child’s growth and independence while damaging your relationship with other family members.

Helicopter parenting hurts children

Helicopter parenting involves hovering over your children’s lives and being involved in every detail, but this can actually hurt them.

Kids who grow up with helicopter parenting are less likely to be independent and responsible.
They grow to rely on their parents for everything, and many never move out on their own. They also struggle with financial responsibility and often can’t pay their own bills or support themselves.

Children may also suffer from self-esteem and confidence issues because they’re used to being told that they need help with everything. They may be emotionally stunted and unable to handle the real world or have stable relationships of their own.

It can hurt your partner

If the parents adopt the helicopter-style, they often neglect each other and hurt their marriage.

You can become so focused on the kids that you ignore each other. You begin to depend on emotional connections and reassurances from your children instead of your partner.

You don’t take the time for date night or other things that help you connect with your partner. Instead, you spend all of your time obsessively monitoring your kids’ lives and worrying about them.

It can hurt your own parents and other family members. By focusing solely on your kids, you often end up neglecting other family members.

Neglecting other family members and not spending time with them is a serious issue for many people who decide to be helicopter parents. They simply don’t have the time to spend with their cousins, aunts, uncles, and others.

It can destroy your friendships

If you’re wrapped up in every tiny detail of your children’s lives, then you don’t have time for friends or other relationships.
When helicopter parenting, your own emotional health starts to suffer, too, since you’re not interacting enough with adults. You’re too busy overparenting to notice that you don’t have other healthy relationships in your life.

The Cost of Helicopter Parenting

There is a real cost to helicopter parenting – monetary, emotional, and physical:

Monetary

Children don’t learn to pay their own bills and grow to depend on their parents to support them forever. They may even marry and have kids of their own, but still rely on their parents for help. This creates an enormous financial burden.

Physical

Children don’t learn to be resilient. Helicopter parents are quick to help them and protect them. They don’t let them grow and learn from mistakes.

Emotional

Kids learn to get all of their needs met, and parents don’t let them evolve and deal with hard feelings.
Boundaries. The lack of physical and emotional boundaries between kids and parents creates a great deal of tension. This also affects spouses and other family members who get neglected.

Role confusion

Role confusion can appear with older kids not feeling like adults and still thinking they’re little. Parents and other family members may also get confused and don’t know what their real roles are anymore.

These are scary facts! Helicopter parenting can harm multiple members of your family. It’s important to realize its impact on everyone.

If you tend to adopt this type of parenting style, it will benefit you, your kids, and everyone around you to be aware of these facts so you can practice giving your children greater responsibility. Don’t worry, they can handle it.

Your kids will love healthy alternatives to Halloween candy if you make them frightfully good!

These are some ideas for healthy holiday food and celebrations that are low on sugar and still a lot of fun.

Healthy Foods to Substitute for Traditional Halloween Candy:

Make your own sinister snacks

Kids love gross things. Use cookie cutters to design homemade cookies in shapes like ghosts and bats. Bake gingerbread zombies with missing limbs. You can adjust the conventional recipes to lower the sugar and substitute whole grain flour for half the white flour.

Kids will also love to eat fruit and vegetables if you arrange them right. Peel grapes so that they look like eyeballs. Make a skeleton shape out of carrot sticks and sliced vegetables.

Try sugar free or organic candy and gum

If you want to serve candy, try sugar-free or organic brands. Read the labels to check on any chemicals you want to avoid and to find out how much sugar they contain. Sugar-free gum is especially good to help keep dental plaque from forming if your kids eat any sugary candy. It stimulates saliva and can help fight tooth decay.

Hand out healthier foods

There are lots of nutritious foods you can hand out for trick or treating or at parties. Focus on sturdy fruits and vegetables like baby carrots, raisins, apples, oranges, or bananas. Try pre-packaged cheese sticks or make your own packets of nuts.

Beware of cereal bars that may have as much sugar and fat as candy.

Create your own trail mix with granola, nuts, and dried fruit.

Sophisticated older children may even like seaweed or unsalted soy nuts.

Serve hot chocolate or juice

Water is the best way to quench your kid’s thirst, but controlled portions of other liquids can also be reasonable choices. Small servings of hot chocolate will provide some warmth if the weather has already turned cold.

Individual juice boxes with straws will provide hydration and vitamins while keeping sugary drinks from sticking to your kid’s teeth.

Other Healthy Halloween Festivities and Ideas:

Consider alternatives to trick or treating

More and more parents are choosing healthy and safe alternatives to trick or treating. These are some party ideas that switch the focus away from the candy.

Have a costume parade

Dressing up is a huge part of the holiday. Let the kids show off their costumes. Dream up creative categories so that everyone gets a prize. You could honor the best princess costume based on a movie and the princess with the prettiest shoes.

Tell scary stories in a haunted house

Halloween is supposed to be creepy. Turn your basement into a dungeon or make your backyard look like a cemetery. Practice some ghost stories or encourage the group to make up their own as they go along. Plant appropriate sound effects and props to enhance the scary parts.

Indulge your creative side

There are all kinds of holiday crafts you can enjoy with your kids. Get free ideas at the library or online. You can decorate pumpkins, make scarecrows, or do some face painting.

Hand out non-food treats

Whether you trick or treat or throw a party, you can hand out treats and favors other than candy. Give children stickers, temporary tattoos, coins, pencil toppers, or small novelty toys. Black toothbrushes will come in especially handy this time of year. Just make sure there are no choking hazards for very young kids.

There are healthy alternatives to Halloween candy that will keep your kids happy and your dental bills down. Make this Halloween good and scary for you and your family.