angorian's Profile

I thought it was weird that this tour article started with an implied criticism of some other parents. It set a tone for the write-up that was desperate for approval....which was so unnecessary since the rooms seem so beautifully loved and lived-in.

My nearly 2 year old loves to help by washing the veggies. She has also helped cut tofu (with a cookie cutter). Of course she loves to help "wash" dishes and can put away all the bowls and plates (we store those in a low cupboard) and sort the cutlery. The great thing about toddlers is that they think it's really fun!

Wow, I love these so much more than their current rather blah polkadot ones! I wish they were still making some in this style.

We like the rule for same number of kids as your age because it's easy for children to understand too and It scales pretty well. Three 3 year olds is pretty manageable and so are eight 8 year olds.

I'm not a big fan of the one-giant-toybox that seems to be popular in this thread. It's certainly easy to clean up, but I don't think it's ideal in terms of presenting the toys for children to play with. I'm all for mixing things together DURING play, but I think when they go away, it's important for things to be organized to facilitate finding things for play the NEXT time.

We have the lower bookshelves in our living room devoted to toys and try to just have about 6-8 out at a time (some with multiple parts of course, like a basket of plastic animals). We always have the play kitchen and related items out and always a box of blocks and a box of duplo (these go under the coffee table). My nearly-2-year-old has no trouble helping clean this up in the 5-10 minutes before dinner. As long as everything has its place and there's not too much to be overwhelming, having organization beyond a single box is definitely feasible. Order is really important to many children at toddler-age and they will naturally follow whatever process you lay out for how to put things away. Of course, different personalities will be more or less amenable to this, but it works for us, at this particular time. I suspect that older children might present more difficulties in keeping a playroom tidy than a toddler ... I think it's not so much capability, but willingness, that is key.

None of these really seem that appropriate for toddlers except maybe the elephant puzzle, and that only once they've mastered the single piece puzzles (the kind where each piece has its own defined space, usually with easy to grasp knobs on the pieces). Some of these seem more pre-schooler level, like the ABC tree, the pigs, and the dinosaurs (though I think this one would be quite challenging to re-assemble actually). In general, I think if your kid is still at the chewing-on-puzzles stage, none of these are going to be suitable yet.

We have had good success with the 13cl Duralex glasses and some tiny dessert-sized plates that are cheap and sturdy, both from the HEMA (a staple in the Netherlands, similar to Target). We also have used some small IKEA bowls and some glass prep bowls that we already had.

ps. I think the idea of regular photos of children as they grow up is great, but I see no particular reason it has to be one of them sitting on Santa's lap, unless that makes it more special for you.

I adored the What-A-Mess books as a child and the illustrations are still fabulous to enjoy as an adult. Sadly, I think they're mostly out of print these days.

I find the suggestion that you have to keep your kids indoors for weeks pretty silly. Maybe you don't want to be out for more than an hour, but you can play outside in just about any weather, as long as you're dressed for it. I remember very few days of "indoor recess" when I was a kid, and a "normal" winter day there is -20C.