Rediscover, pass on, make space.
Before December arrives, I love setting aside a couple of hours to go through toys, games, books and clothes together. Not a huge clear-out. Just a chance to rediscover forgotten favourites and make a little room for what's to come.
Three baskets are all you need.
Keep & Rediscover
This is the best bit. The puzzle that slipped under the bed, the book everyone forgot they loved, the little family of animals tucked at the bottom of a box.
Give the keepers a home where they can actually be seen. Toys that pack away into their own home help enormously here, like the Little Wardrobe Suitcase from Moulin Roty or the Forest Mushrooms Basket in its handmade rattan basket.
For everything else, our Play & Go storage bags are a little bit of magic. They open out flat into a playmat, then draw up into a bag in seconds, so the bricks, the train track and the tiny figures all have a home and tidy-up time takes moments.
Pass It On
The toys and clothes that have been outgrown but still have plenty of play left in them. A younger cousin, a friend's new baby, a toy library, a nursery or the charity shop on the high street.
Let children choose where things go. They're often far more generous than we expect when they know a toy is off to someone who'll love it.
Recycle
The puzzle with three pieces missing, the toy that's been loved a little too hard, the box of odds and ends nobody can quite place. Rather than the bin, give them a second life. In London, The Toy Project collects used toys and passes them on to children who need them. In Glasgow, Make Do and Grow in Govan gives preloved toys and clothes a new home and turns odds and ends into creative reuse. For the well-worn pyjamas, textile banks will take the rest.
And those stacks of paintings and drawings? Save the best for next month's gift wrap.
Make a Little Space
By the end, everyone knows what they already have. Perhaps that enormous new box of building blocks isn't quite so necessary after all!
It turns a Christmas list from more things into the right things. If there's already a box of CONNETIX on the shelf, a small add-on like the Travel Mini Pack might be all that's needed to make it feel brand new.
A LITTLE TIP: Pop a few keepers in a box marked January. When the post-Christmas lull arrives, bringing them back out feels like a second little Christmas.
A tiny note from Alexis
It's often the smallest moments that matter most. Sitting on the floor together, finding a forgotten favourite, deciding who might love a toy next. Those are usually the bits they remember.
Thank you, as always, for reading and for supporting a small independent business like ours.
Alexis x
Founder, Binky
