TIDY UP TIME CHAMPIONS WITH MINENE

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So, this is a bit of a real life post. Here are my three, one in pants, one with dirty face and big brother looking the most presentable, in their toy-covered bedroom that they have yet to tidy, again.  Normally I’d clear up before taking any photos, but here they are in their jumble of toys and trinkets.

Here’s the annoying bit – are your little ones like mine?  Do they come home from pre-school or school with stickers across their sweatshirts, proclaiming how excellent they’ve been?  Are those stickers for AMAZING tidying up?  Do they EVER clean up at home? Nope, mine either.  Yet according to pre-school and school teachers, my boys are the ultimate in helpful assistants in the tidy up department.

Now I do know how this works.  Having spent a few years as a teacher I used to smugly laugh at parents who told me this tale.  I couldn’t imagine why they would do it for me and not for their parents.  So now I’m bitten by karma.  My boys are pretty bad at picking things up – or rather, really good at letting me know just how hard it is for them to do it.

I like keeping the toys seperate – LEGO [two sizes], wooden bricks, Play Doh and Plasticine, Little People… You get the picture. There is nothing worse than having to search for Rapunzel the Little Person or a set of LEGO wheels that you need in seven different boxes.  So I tidy up that way, but my boys think this is the equivalent of tidy up torture.

I’ve gone for a new tactic.  Minene have these gorgeous soft storage baskets – ours is pale blue with grey stars – and what I now do is at tidy up time, I drag it into the middle of the floor and the boys can put everything into it.  I’m fine distributing it into the boxes because it’s a start at tidying and they are only little after all.  The storage baskets are HUGE.  They can fit so much in there and they never have a problem with overflow.

We all love this basket.  It’s played with when it’s empty in make believe land, and it’s so durable that the stitching doesn’t budge and it stands upright without any sign of ugly sagging whilst it’s in the corner of the room on display either.  I’m slightly in love with the floral ones for laundry baskets at the moment.

I’ve been crafting a chore board for them when they start back at school that I’m excited to show you!