Dear daughters,
Since the start of the year I have been doing a bit of decluttering. I am hoping to bring more simplicity into our lives. You may have noticed some of your toys disappear. I felt a pang of guilt when you asked me for your doll baby bath last week and your big bag of mega blocks. I knew they were undoubtedly in the toy collection of other children by that time. Other than that, you don’t seem to have noticed the many other toys I have subtly extracted from the house.
Last week I watched a short clip by a minimalist, Joshua Becker, about why experiences are better than things. Coincidently, you were at the kangaroo park at the time. When you got home you were beaming and falling over your words to report back on your day out. As far as I can recall, you have never been quite so animated about any toy or object in your possession. This is why I am decluttering.
Of all the toys you still house in your playroom, the things you enjoy most are typically non-toys. I am constantly turning around to find you, baby Thea, pulling my silver mixing bowls from the cupboard. If I need to distract you, I do not reach for a doll or a rattle, rather my wallet is the thing that amuses you endlessly. If I need to cook dinner? Just let you raid any draw in the kitchen and throw every item onto the floor.
I have watched you all play with a stick on the beach for over half an hour. It was a horse, it was a tightrope, it was just a very cool stick. There are few toys at home which will amuse you for quite as long as that. Toys have their place but unless they allow for open-ended play, they don’t even hold your attention long enough for me to make a cup of tea.
So, I continue to ask myself, how many toys do you actually need? In my opinion you still have too many; you play with the same ones over and over. The rest might get a look-in when they are lucky enough to serve as a prop for your make-believe or if you glimpse them during a sort-out.
If I had my time again, I would not let most of the toys into our house in the first place. It is much harder to evict Barbie and her friends once they are well established residents of the playroom. The same goes for fluffy toys, anything that makes a noise, plastic items and those pesky collectables you get for free from the supermarket. If it’s a block, a puzzle, a book, wooden or an item that allows for imaginative licence, it can stay.
The difference in your play has been remarkable since doing regular decluttering of your toy collection. I love watching you take familiar items and turn them into something new; something imagined in your mind and then recreated in real life. My washing baskets are boats, cardboard boxes become cameras and rice is an ocean in which your sea creatures wade.
In a world which reveres the accumulation of stuff, I’m aware I’m swimming upstream in order to simplify your lives. But the obvious positive benefits I have witnessed, in just the few short months since pursuing simplicity and decluttering, have been undeniable.
As we continue to make more space in our lives – to free ourselves from the weight of excess possessions and concentrate on experiences over stuff – may your childhood be all the richer for it. I hope you will one day forgive me about the doll bath and thank me for allowing room to make lasting memories.
Love,
Mum
