De-junking The Toy Collection

It is November! Only 21 more days until Thanksgiving!!!!

Maybe this blog should have been called "Crazy Lady Loves Books" because I cannot explain how excited I get when I see the Berenstain Bears's book "Messy Room."

Heart racing image from here

Seriously, a before and after of a good, organized room might be the best thing in the whole world!

If I had 3 hours to do whatever I wanted to do it would probably be spent organizing something or drawing up a plan for how it should be organized.

That being said, recently, Cora's toys have been getting out of control. I needed to follow the advice of Mama Bear and get that junk organized. There also needed to be a major purge. Most of the overflow accrued from this shop-til-you-drop event. I couldn't stop myself. But lessons have been learned. Next time, I will go into the consignment sale with a full stomach (or whatever the equivalent of that would be when you're shopping for toys and clothes instead of groceries).

beautiful, beautiful room and proud Mama Bear image from here

Here is most of the toy collection that was in our play area for Cora in our kitchen. I have been trying to get Cora to understand the idea of clean-up. She kind of gets it. She thinks it means that she has to put whatever she is playing with into the green bucket and choose something new. 

Usually, when Cora goes down for a nap or goes to bed at night I will organize the whole area. I do a much better job than the photo below. But I wanted you to get a better idea of how much she has in her toy collection. So, you did not get the special clean-up treatment (yet!).

Cora's cup runneth over. She is set in the toy and book department!

So much so that she hardly knows what toys she has and usually opts for toys like a cup with a lid she can take on and off (and on and off and on and off and on and then get really frustrated because she can't get it off. Then, hold it in my face and say hhmmughh until I help her open it, and repeat).

Here are all of the toys that we weeded out. Most of them will go into the attic in case we have another baby who is interested in the most miniature play kitchen you have ever seen or a set of measuring cups. Some of them will go to Cora's play area in the funky, retro bonus room.

Peek-a-boo babytoddler in the backgound!

Here is what we were left with!

I love this one because everything is organized and it even looks like Cora is vacuuming!

These days, when you tell Cora you love her she returns the love by blowing kisses. #heartmelt (cannot believe I just used a hash tag. It happened. Let's try to pretend it didn't).

OK, I have to be honest- some of her toys went into an ottoman that used to be completely empty. But what a difference! Everything is so much easier to tidy up now too!

I think I did Mama Bear proud!

Does the book, "Messy Room" put a smile on your face too? If so, make sure you stay tuned during the month of January. We will be starting 2013 fresh with lots of organizing tips, tricks, and before and afters!!!



I'm sure I must have overheard someone say they were looking for a little update on Cora and her relationship with her box?
Well, here it comes!

Cora used to be a bit unsure about boxes. She now LOVES them! Boy oh boy how times have changed. The girl goes wild over a box. Today, we were up in the funky, retro bonus room and she spotted a box that she had never seen before. She stopped, smiled, looked at me like, "is this for real?!??!" Then she went running over to explore the box. Her old box is coming to an end. So, if anyone gets a new refrigerator and wants to make Cora's year let me know!

In this photo, you can even see some boxes on the deck. They are outside from an activity we did the other day. Don't fret, I'll share it with you soon!

and ps... I swept those stinkin' leaves less than a week before I took these photos but Fall came on strong this week and I couldn't keep up!

I will be back with another Cora-centric post later today. Spoiler alert: Cora was one cute bumble bee and we carved our pumpkin as a fish.

The Daily Election Would You Rather Question:

WYR... elect Ross from  the TV show, Friends, as President of the USA

or

elect Monica from Friends?