How to get kids to take charge and declutter (No, really!)featured
Hey friends with littles: This one’s for you! How to get kids to declutter their own spaces– no, for real, you guys.
If your summertime involves lots of face time with the smaller set, you may be wondering if it’s possible to cull, sort, organize, and generally get your spaces in order with so, so many “helpers” underfoot. Short answer: Yes!
(Longer answer: Yes! …After plenty of hiking, swimming, beaching, exploring, and fairy home-crafting time. Also rainy days. Never underestimate the power of a good decluttering session on a rainy summer afternoon. Follow it up with a session of blanket tent-buildin’ and old movie-watchin’.)
Hard won lesson #1 re: kids n’ clutter:
Kids are calmer- and better able to clean their spaces- when there’s less physical “noise.”
(And guess what? So much of it is noise. Scrap papers, unused collections, and excess in any form.)
Start here:
Dump all small to medium-sized collections onto baking sheets. (You know the ones: LOL Surprise Dolls, erasers shaped as animals, colored pencils, Pokemon cards, etc., etc., etc.) Have the kids sort into piles of “must keep,” “could trade/sell/share,” and “recycle/donate/trash.” Once you’ve got distinct “keep” piles, that’s when you start looking for good containers to house ’em all. (And think outside the box for this one, so to speak. Excellent kiddo collection-holders can be anything from jars to those cute subscription service boxes to smallish, stackable luggage pieces. Envision how the collections will be pulled out, and picture how you’d like to see them displayed. Instagram-ready shelves ain’t just for adults!)
Moving on:
Library time! Have them remove all book jackets from hardcovers, cull all books that are too young or otherwise too unread, and give them free rein to sort their books by color, size, shape, series, or however they want their personal reading nook to look.
Still going strong?
Never underestimate children’s and tweens’ abilities to figure out what’s scrapbook-worthy! All of those piles on desks and countertops and in bins containing artistic masterpieces and scholarly greatness? Hand ’em over. Have them make the tough decisions of what deserves fridge space, what can be scanned and uploaded (to then be sent to Google Photos, saved to a file, or kept on a personal flash drive) and ultimately recycled, and what can be momentarily marveled at- and then cheerfully sent on its way. (A three-pile system is your friend. Always. Always.)
Now the fun part:
Source some sturdy floating shelves (Amazon and IKEA have some great, affordable options) and position them by desks or headboards. Hey kid: Meet your new job as Museum Curator! Those beyond-special toys, figurines, or knick knacks can take center stage on these tiny platforms, with the main gallery changing up as the mood strikes. (Bonus: Once people figure out what’s super duper important to showcase, it’s way easier to pass along other treasures to smaller- extremely grateful- hands.)
For the entrepreneurs:
Once they’ve created a trim li’l bedroom/playroom/happy crafting space of their own? They can help send the rest on its way! Think: donating (or even selling for tiny amounts!) treasures on Facebook or neighborhood groups, starting a Little Free Library in your very own yard, having a special “sale” box alongside a lemonade stand, and walking the rest over to a nearby donation center to see their goods in action.
And I don’t really need to tell you about the gift-that-keeps-giving when you teach kids to declutter on the regular, do I?
Says the gal whose 8 year-old just reorganized a local play place’s pretend kitchen during a 20-minute visit. (“What’re you doing, pal?” “Fixing it, Mommy.”)
(My work here is done.)
Ready to get ’em to work?
Comment below!
