Have you ever felt overwhelmed during the month of December with all the stuff that enters your home? The trick I've found helps me is to declutter throughout the month. Will you join me in the Net Zero Decluttering Challenge?
Each day this month I'll share some decluttering tips and ideas so you can end the month with the same number of items in your home (or maybe even less!) than what you started the month with.
Today I'm sharing tips on decluttering your kids' small toys (you know all those little things they get in restaurant meals, loot bags, and last year's stocking).
Today's Suggested Decluttering Task
Small toys are small... but when you have a lot of them they really add up! And you'll likely have a bunch of new ones showing up in stockings or gift baskets or grab bags during the holidays.
The annoying thing about small toys is they fall to the bottom of toy boxes or storage bins and they get forgotten about. Which means they don't get played with.
I think we need to almost think of small toys as disposable items that get played with when you first get them and then decluttered. That way they don't clutter up playrooms or bedrooms or living rooms.
Those things may be small but they sure look like a tornado went through a playroom when they're left all around! And who hasn't stepped on some small toys that were left laying around?!
So today, take some time to declutter your kids' small toys! Here are a few tips:
- Toss anything that is broken or missing pieces (which often happens with small toys!)
- Donate any small toys that haven't been played with for a few months
- Give away small toys your kids have forgotten about. This is one of the few categories I sometimes declutter without my kids. Little toys are not as special as bigger ones and they just forget they have them. But if they help me declutter they see them again and want to keep them. It's easier to just declutter them myself and they will never remember those toys are gone.
Here are a couple of posts with more tips:
And here are a few posts with tips for organizing toys (in case you want to do that after you declutter).
If you want to prevent small toy clutter in the future, having a good system to organize small toys is helpful. These are the toy organizer bins we use. I recommend them if you have a lot of small toys because the small bins make it easier to see all the small toys, as well as categorize them. That makes cleaning up easier too because they can just take out one small bin of like toys, play with them, and then toss them all back in the small bin.
Labels help too :) I recommend chalk labels like these because you can easily help change what's written on the labels as your kids toys change (which happens a lot with small toys especially!).
Decluttering Our Small Toys
I need to go through my kids' toys before Christmas. We haven't decluttered them in awhile so we're definitely due! This weekend is pretty busy but I'm hoping we can tackle the toys next weekend. I might do a little small toy decluttering while they're at school this week :) But you can check out the posts above for pictures of toy decluttering we've done in the past.
I did find a few Happy Meal toys that were never opened or were duplicates so I decluttered those. Along with some extra water bottles, a note pad, an old toaster oven tray, 2 cups, and a golf salt and pepper shaker set.
My Progress in the #NetZeroClutter challenge
So that puts me at -15 items today in the #NetZeroClutter challenge and -45 overall. I'm aiming for an average of 10 items per day so I will declutter 300 items by the end of the month. That's about how many items I'm estimating will enter our home this month so hopefully I'll break even :)
What's Next For You?
Take some time today to declutter your kids' small toys. Or anything you'd like to declutter! Take some pictures and share your progress on social media using the hashtag #NetZeroClutter. Let me know how you're doing in the challenge so I can cheer you on!
Sign up to receive my blog posts by email so you get each day's post in your email inbox every morning. You can unsubscribe after the challenge is over if you don't want to continue receiving my blog posts by email.
I'd also love for you to join our 365 Items in 365 Days Facebook group as you do this challenge! You'll be able to share with others what you're decluttering and feel encouraged and inspired by everyone else who is also decluttering!
If you'd like more decluttering ideas, you can check out my Decluttering/Purging Tips & Ideas board on Pinterest.
So that's the Net Zero Decluttering Challenge! I'm so excited to do this myself and to have you join me. I can't wait to hear all the stories of how much more you're enjoying your holidays because you're not overwhelmed by all the stuff in your home!
How many small toys did you declutter? What can you fill your kids' stockings with that won't lead to small toy clutter throughout the year?
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Here are all the posts in this challenge in case you missed any or want to share some with your friends or family!
