The Fine Art of Throwing Out Old Toys

With Santa Claus soon to visit our home and drop off toys for a little boy who has been pretty good all year, I find myself struggling with the problem that every mother faces:  which toys do you throw out or donate to make room for the new ones?  Sure, it was easy when my three-year-old was a baby.  The exer-saucer, the soft blocks, the playmat?  Out the door when he grew out of them.  But now this kid has a memory so I must be more careful.

My son seems to have a hand on all his toys.  I'll monitor which ones he has not touched in months, my eye on a few that I think he's forgotten about, only to have him play with them all over again!  Now what? Today I took my chances.  I threw out one of those parking garage toys that I loved when I was little but was pretty much a bust with him.  But it did take up a lot of room, will he notice it's gone and cry for his parking garage?  

And what of the toys that he's gotten as gifts and hasn't played with but that he MAY play with in the future?  A dump truck with sound effects?  A wooden tool box with nuts and bolts?  A mini laptop on which he is still too young to play most of the games?  

Maybe I am making too big of a deal about this, but I remember missing some of the toys that my mother decided I no longer played with.  There was my koala bear stuffed animal and my Betty Boop rag doll. And my Mrs. Beasley paper dolls, of which so scarred me for life that years later I bought both the paper dolls and the 1967 talking doll on ebay. I now realize what Mom was up against and can finally forgive her.

Well Christmas isn't going to wait for me so I'd better get back to it.  Making room for the new toys that in six months to a year from now may be suffering the same fate as the ones that now crowd my home.  

This is an original post to New Jersey Moms Blog.  When not being completely overwhelmed by various holiday stresses, Emily writes about being a mom with chronic illness on her own blog, Mama Sick.