[blparent] Pieces, pieces, everywhere!

Thu Dec 31 05:18:54 UTC 2009

as you know, when they're this young, you have to do the keeping track, and 
I agree whole-heartedly that it's a huge pain. I love Leanne's idea of the 
plastic drawers with labels for when they're old enough to start doing their 
own clean up. Right now, I do something similar, but without the labels. I 
have a metal shelf-type-thing that holds a bunch of small plastic totes. 
They have open tops, so they're easy for her to look into, and to get things 
out of. I also use laundry baskets that are low to the ground for larger 
toys that won't fit neatly into containers.

I'm wondering though, if you could tape photos of the toys onto the fronts 
of containers or drawers to cue Sara. I think I might look into doing this 
for Elise, too. Then, as she gets older, we can use clean up as kind of a 
matching game. "Put the blocks where you see the picture of the blocks, 
etc." That way, we could do it all pre-reading.

Here's what I do to deal with the small pieces right now. It has kept me 
from losing anything so far... At least, permanently :). Things have 
definitely gone on mini vacations behind the dresser...

When I gather up the toys Elise has played with, I actually put small pieces 
into Ziplock bags. So, I'll put the Fridge Farm into its tote thing, and set 
the Ziplock with all the magnets in there with it. Then, when she shows 
interest in the larger part of the Fridge Farm, I'll bring out the magnets, 
too. (I should add that this is only effective because she hasn't figured 
out how to open Ziplocks yet.) Perhaps I'll graduate to small plastic 
containers with complicated lids when she does :). This allows me to know 
what small pieces are out on the floor at any given time, so I know what to 
look for when it's time to pick everything up.

I also try to get Elise to help me clean up. I've started asking her 
directly for things. "where's tigger. give tigger to mommy." Sara's a bit 
older, so you might be able to do something fun like set a timer and say, 
"let's see who can find the most toys and put them away before time runs 
out." or "can you find where all the blocks are hiding?"

The other thing I do, which may sound a bit OCD, but it's worked for me, is 
that I try to keep certain toys in certain areas of the house. Elise has 
certain things she plays with in her room, certain things she plays with in 
the car, etc. This way, when something's missing, I have the vaguest idea of 
where to look for it. Obviously, this isn't fool proof, but it does seem to 
help.

Speaking of playing with certain things in certain areas of the house, I 
also limit how many toys are out at a time. If she's just pulling everything 
out of every container and throwing it onto the floor, I'll just calmly say 
"we don't need all of these things out at the same time. let's pick a few 
things to play with now." I'll leave out the three or so things she seems to 
be most interested in, and put everything else away. Along those same lines, 
I have several friends who swap out their kids' toys. So, they'll put half 
of the toys into a Rubber Made for a month or so, and then swap them out for 
the half the child's been playing with. They say this keeps their kids from 
feeling overwhelmed by too many choices, and allows them to feel that 
they're always getting new things to play with. This is something I'm about 
to try with Elise, so I'll let you know how it goes :).

Finally, about once a week, I have Jason do what I affectionately refer to 
as the "toy round-up." He looks under all of the beds, couches, etc. to 
check for toys. It's a heck of a lot faster for him to do this than it is 
for me. Also, I'm always amazed what I find while cleaning.

Hope some of these ideas help. I think I'm going to look into the picture 
labels.

Dena

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Leanne Merren" <leemer02 at gmail.com>
To: "NFBnet Blind Parents Mailing List" <blparent at nfbnet.org>
Sent: Tuesday, December 29, 2009 12:16 PM
Subject: Re: [blparent] Pieces, pieces, everywhere!

> Hi Jo Elizabeth,
> Keeping track of pieces and keeping things picked up is very tricky.  I've 
> found that the plastic storage drawers work pretty well though.  I have 
> labeled them, so I know which are which and so as the children get older, 
> they know which drawers to put things in as well.  That's what I've found 
> to work at my house.
> Leanne
> ----- Original Message ----- 
> From: "Jo Elizabeth Pinto" <jopinto at pcdesk.net>
> To: "NFBnet Blind Parents Mailing List" <blparent at nfbnet.org>
> Sent: Monday, December 28, 2009 4:18 PM
> Subject: [blparent] Pieces, pieces, everywhere!
>
>
>> Hi, all.  Sarah got a lot of nice gifts for Christmas.  Among them were 
>> some Little People toys, some finger puppets, and replacement animals for 
>> her depopulated Noah's Ark.  She also has had some basic puzzles and 
>> shape sorters.  It's only been a few days since the holiday, but the 
>> question is already coming up for me: How do I go about keeping track of 
>> all the little pieces?  Sarah's napping, and I usually take that 
>> opportunity to put everything away.  I like her to wake up to a neat 
>> room, if only so she can mess it up all over again.  But I find that I'm 
>> missing pieces to some of the Little People toys and puzzles, and I've 
>> crawled around searching under and behind furniture.  Is this just going 
>> to be the way it is, or is there some ingenious method I don't know of to 
>> keep track of all this stuff?  Thanks.
>>
>> Jo Elizabeth
>>
>> Until lions have their historians, tales of the hunt shall always glorify 
>> the hunters.--African Proverb
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