Kids, Toys And Charity

During the course of every year, my kids collected a huge amount of toys.  Christmas and birthdays obviously created the largest influxes, but Easter, Valentines day, every Happy Meal, and every $2 toy bought to amuse them on a shopping trip all added up as well.  By the end of each year, my kids had more toys than you could poke a stick at!  Despite the fact that I had made a huge built-in multi compartmented toy box in the loungeroom, and they kept a selection in the bedroom, plus outside toys kept outside, plus bath toys kept in the bathroom, we still ran out of room to keep them all.  Not to mention how tired I got of picking them up all the time!

I used to loathe my mother doing a clean up of my toys as she had a nasty tendancy to assume that all my toys were of equal value to me, not realising that some I held precious.  Many parents assume that just because the toy isn't in the best condition it needs to go.  That just because it wasn't given to the child by someone special, it holds no sentimental value.  That just because the child hasn't played with it for a long time, the child no longer wants it.

I once had a cheap toy truck that was rather battered that Dad bought for me on a shopping trip, and I hadn't played with it for quite a long time.  I had quite a number of other toy trucks that I played with more often that were in far better condition.  So, when Mum was cleaning up, she got rid of that toy truck.  I didn't notice it was gone for a very long time.  When I did find out it was gone, I was devistated.  I had put the truck in the bottom of the toy box and not played with it so that it wouldn't get anymore broken.  I didn't care what it cost, that it was just another toy bought on a shopping trip didn't bother me.  Even that it was Dad that gave it to me like he had many others isn't what made that truck important.  What made it important was that truck held fond memories for me, because I took it with me one day to play with at my cousin's house, and I had a really good time there.  I'd had that truck for months already, but that day I played with that truck in a place where I was very happy, I felt safe, and didn't want to leave - ever.  But of course I had to, so that truck became my little momento of that day.  As such, it was precious to me, and it became landfill.

Because this happened to me as a child, I'm very mindful of what my children might find precious.  So I don't get rid of any toys without consulting them first.  Of course, they don't want to surrender any toys if they don't have any motivation to do so, and I searched for a while to find one.  I use a combination of two tactics:  their sense of fairness and reward.  Here's how it goes...

I remind them how there are many children in the world that have no toys at all.  I might read to them a newspaper story about a family with kids that lost everything in a house fire, or explain the poverty in other parts of the world such as India, with some not too terrible pictures from the internet or a magazine.  I bring a real-life tragic situation to their attention and this creates in them a sense of longing to help the kids less fortunate than they are.  So then they ask what can they do to help those kids.  I tell them that they can give them some of their own toys that they don't want anymore, and add in the bribe that if they do this, they will be rewarded, and I offer a bribe.  They might get to go somewhere special for a day, or they might get one cool new toy in exchange for all the old ones.  Trading one toy for 100 isn't a bad offer when wanting to downsize.

This creates a frenzy of emptying the toy boxes out to search for every toy they own.  We carefully go through them together, putting the toys into three piles.  Pile one are all the toys to keep.  Pile two are the broken toys that should go in the bin.  Pile three are all the toys they are willing to give away to kids that don't have toys.  We put the toys to keep back in the toybox.  Then we go through the broken toys pile, double checking every toy.  Do they really want to throw it out?  Does being broken really matter?  Can it be fixed?  Most of the time we end up with one or two toys to fix, one that is kept for sentimental reasons, and the remainder go in the bin.  This usually gets rid of one bag full, which isn't a bad little dent in the problem.

The toughest task is left until last.  This is going through the toys that are perfectly fine that the kids want to donate.  This pile is usually pretty big, as my kids can't handle the idea of other kids having nothing at all to play with.  Often, they will want to donate toys that they will miss later on, so we have to be careful with making the decision about each toy.

Once the selection has been made, we often end up with about three or more bags of toys to give away.  I put them away for one month, and then I drag them out again.  The kids haven't seen them for a while, and there are usually a few toys that they have missed among them.  These toys get put back into the toy box, and the rest then go to a charitable second-hand store.  The kids then get their agreed reward, we have less to clean up, and the kids have been given a sense of charity in doing so.  It is something that works out good all round.

It is especially good to do when it it coming up to Christmas and birthdays, as it creates room for the big influx of new toys.  Sometimes, if our clean up is close enough to these times, their bribe is what they wanted and were going to get for Christmas/birthday anyway, which makes it a bit easier and cheaper as well.