Toys

Bins and bins of toys.

That’s what the shelves in David’s closet hold.

The seemingly random trinkets, the here-and-theres, parts of things you would hold in your hand and be completely unable to identify; he not only knows what they are, but he knows he has them and where they should be located.

They go in his bins.

Now, I am all for sentimental connection to things I’ve been given. Trust me; my husband and I have had lengthy, and not always cool conversations about it. But David takes this connection to “his things” to a new level that I have a hard time grasping; though I must say I admire it.

But we need space. And some of the things in his bins, they… they just gotta go. Broken, missing parts, you name it. We tried being diplomatic this weekend as we attempted some Fall cleaning and purging.

“David, can we have this go bye-bye or should David keep it?”

“DAVID KEEP IT.”

“Okay, but it’s brok…”

“DAVID KEEP IT.”

Okay….got it.

Through all of this attempted (but failed) Fall cleaning, we created a huge sea of toys on the floor in his room. David ended up spending hours this weekend in there, playing and scripting with his toys, his tablet no where in sight. Even had to compose myself a few times when he asked me to go back in his room to play with them (insert giddy happy dance).

So, as much as I didn’t love leaving it all lay there, I left everything out for a few days, untouched – so he had access to all of these rediscovered toys he didn’t know he’s been missing all this time.

However, tonight we had to clean in preparation for therapy after school tomorrow.

So, Drew took David into the living room, and they were playing while I threw what I knew was literal garbage into a bag. During one particular bin cleaning, I found this pile of Christmas ornaments and decorations that the little scheister stole off our tree and hutch last Christmas and hid in his room.

Melts my heart how much this boy loves Christmas (He’s already asked me to put up the Christmas Tree this year). Worries me a little that he’s willing to steal from our tree to hold his favorite ornaments hostage, but hey… I can accept it since he loves the season as much as mommy does!

As I had a good laugh, looking over his pile of hoarded Christmas items, David heard me crinkle the bag in his room – and immediately came marching into the fray, sat down on his bed, scanning the pile; he saw the pile I made of these ornaments, pointed at it, and said…

“KEEP IT”.

Then he walked back out by dad, and proceeded to check the toy bin in the living room for all of his favorite treasures in there as well to make sure nothing was missing.

This has been a bittersweet experience. We may not have gotten to do all of the purging we’d hoped for, but what we did get was the awesome sight of David interested in playing with toys; and that is something we have longed to see for some time.

I had my goals set for the weekend, but David showed me it’s also important to take a step back and take it all in.

Boy knows what’s important. 💙