What Do You Do with All the Stuff That Comes Home with Your Kids??

I have bins with the toys we're keeping and we throw away the rest of the stuff. I try to recycle if they are plastic. We even go through the good toys once a year and send them to younger relatives or donate them. Books go to younger relatives too or the school library.

Can you put them in a box and just keep them for a while? thats what i do. Then later you look at it and keep the best of it.

Any paper projects my kids come home with, I do one of two things...1) I take a picture of my kid with the art project and then throw it away (when they aren't looking, of course) or 2) decide it is reallllly worth keeping and put it in their keepsake box. The stupid junky toys that come in McDonalds happy meal toys I usually throw away after finding it discarded on the floor. My kids typically don't even realize it is missing!

I know exactly what you mean..all those little toys and pieces of plastic seem to be in a million little piles all over my house all the time (I have 3 sons)! I just pitch it after I know that have forgotten about them. Bigger toys and books we do give away to charity but the smaller stuff goes in the garbage. I also agree with the mom who said she sorts through the paper items with her kids at the end of each week, I do that as well and I actually think it is really important to teach your kids how to sort and prioritize! You can't keep everything, and teaching them to decide is a good life skill.
We have these Art Portfolios for the boys and I really like those for keeping their most special projects safe :-)
http://www.onestepahead.com/catalog/product.jsp?productId...

Just think- once a child is in Preschool or Kindergarten, they will be bringing things home from school, until they graduate from High School.
That is YEARS, of them bringing home things, from school.
So, where is that all going to go?
So you either throw it away, take photos of it then toss it, or you keep bins and bins and bins of your kids things. And store it somehow. And it will take up space in the home.

In my city, Goodwill etc., does not take kids toys. Because, of safety hazards or various recalls of toys.
So then, you can donate it to a school or somewhere, or throw it away.

Recycle what you can and toss the rest. I have a bin for the things I may want to keep and only keep 5 things from that year - the rest goes in the bin (recycle or waste). I am a tosser/purger and have no issues throwing things away if I were closer I would come over and help you out.

Well I have no problem throwing that stuff away, it IS garbage, lol!
I don't know if you have anything like this in your town but we have a place called the Recycle/Reuse Depot. People drop off all kinds of random things--fabric scraps, old crayons, wrapping paper, bottles, toys, picture frames, old holiday decorations, misc. craft supplies, junk jewelry, you name it--then the store organizes it all into categories and people come through and take what they want. It is a TREASURE trove for artists, teachers, scout leaders and the like.
If you have something like this in your town I would put all that stuff in gallon ziplocs and donate it there. If not, chuck it all! Decluttering is like losing weight, it's hard to make that first step but feels SO good in the end!

I have 2 kids (7 and 4) and they are both in school. The amount of stuff they bring home gives me anxiety. I don't like (scratch that), I hate clutter!!!
Here is what we started doing AFTER I was "caught" throwing a painting in the garbage:

Artwork/school work: we go through it together at the end of each week. We pickout the best/favorites and put them in their memory folder. The rest we recycle. We recycle it with a lesson about taking care of our earth, etc...they feel more like they are helping because garbage is such a BAD thing to kids.

Little toys, we recycle them back to the class. I pick them up occassionally and add them to the donation bag (hidden safely in my drawer) and take it to the class once in a while. They have never once mentioned that they got the same toy out of the treasure box twice. :)

I keep the good stuff and chuck the rest.

Art projects-Take a picture of them with your children and throw them out-trinkets, collect them in a single place and "recycle" them into the next goodie bags you give out at the end of the school year

I have a couple little pencil boxes and small buckets in my girls playroom- filled with little jewels, books of tattoos, plastic rings, oriental trading tops, whistles, tiny plastic animals.. I know, WHY am I saving this stuff? The whole bucket should just go in the trash!!!!

It's worse if your kid likes tiny things or "treasures", any small little tchotchke is something special. My neice is awful- tiny stickers, tiny beads etc. She loves to dump out and comb through our buckets of tiny things. And she always comes over with a purse full of funky small odds and ends to trade.

I try to contain it in a few places but anytime I catch myself sorting a little useless string of beads or small strip of stickers into the "right" place, I think I should just be putting it in the trash instead because no one would miss it...

Recycle most of it, but I make a scrapbook per every 2 years of my kids lives, cream of the crop.

I keep certain projects like ones with handprints (things like this are kept in a large, plastic flat bin under my bed) or that have special meaning or was a large project that he wants to keep in his room or hang on his wall. Weekly spelling test goes on the fridge and gets replaced (and tossed) every Monday. Everything else gets looked at and then thrown out.

Plastic toys, etc. get thrown away as soon as I find them on the floor. I go through their toys every 6 months or so and donate the things I haven't seen since the last time. They know the routine and will often help me at picking what stays and what goes.

Keep a bag in your car and toss the cheap small toys in there. Don't let them even come into the house.

School papers go into a folder. Notices, reminders and things to pay for go up on our magnetic board next to our calendar, and are taken down and put into the folder as soon as the date passes. Projects go in a bin under the table we keep the folder.

All existing toys? Trash anything worth below $5. All others - clear out the toy bin or shelf or box and tell your kids whatever doesn't fit in there you'll have to get rid of - no ifs ands or buts.

The kids know I don't keep everything, so they get to pick what stays and what goes - unless it's a piece of art I LOVE and then it stays :).

Can you let them help decide what stays and what goes? Goody bag stuff has a life span of MAYBE 72 hours before I toss it.

Happy Meal toys and goody-bag trinkets eventually end up in the trash - they might stick around a few days, maybe a week, and then they "disappear" while DD is not around and she does not even notice.

As for artwork and other stuff from school - I save what to me is worth saving, but I am not going to save every little scrap of paper she's scribbled on or glued things to. Otherwise we would be drowning in it. I honestly don't worry about it "going to waste" because it's really not doing any good cluttering up our house either. I do try to throw as much as I can into the recycle bin.

While they're away (Shhhhhhhhh!!!!) garbage bag and PITCH. Or round up the "toy" stuff and donate to the school to use for prizes for the carnivals, etc. Or let Goodwill sort out what's junk and what's not, right, if it makes you feel better.
(I'm the mom that used to pitch or leave behind the Happy Meal toys on the way out the door back in the day!)

School papers I want to keep? My kid has an under bed bin for each year. Later (1-2 years out) I further reduce, and combine 2 years into O. bin.

Paperwork requiring action or marking on the calendar--try to do it right away.

Other papers (non keepers) go right back into the school's paper recycling program bin.

To make it easier for you and to make sure you keep on top of decluttering...bag it ALL up (even the tops from OT) and give it to Goodwill. They sort thru everything anyway so THEY can decide if its something they want to keep or not.

I have been downsizing and decluttering. It really makes it easier to stay organized. Every few months I try to go thru the kids room and give all that small stuff they don't really play with anymore to Goodwill.

Good luck!