Every few months I do a toy cleanup where I toss broken toys, donate barely played-with toys, and scrub down the playroom. I find that after doing a toy room overhaul, my girls have a newfound love for their play area and spend more time discovering things they were too inundated to see when all their toys were scattered. This latest toy cleanup involved getting rid of some heavily used, bigger toys like their old Little Tikes kitchen. I bought the kitchen when my oldest was a little over 1, but my middle child had claimed it as her own by coloring on it, placing stickers everywhere, and even attempting to cook real food in it. No amount of cleaning could erase what my little artist had done, and because of the appearance, it was no longer played with.
