Toys and more toys

Today I bribed my daughter into cleaning up her toys in the storage room that we refer to as the cement room, as it is an unfinished portion of our basement. I tried sweet talking her and then tried to coerce her. I think she sensed my desperation and began negotiations. I ended up agreeing to a Mc Nugget meal and a Mc Flurry.

I had a brief moment of optimism as she sat her pouty self down on the concrete floor and said I could give away the rubber maid container of Barbies . I immediately placed the Barbie tub in the give away pile only to hear her say, "No, I think I still want some of them." It went downhill from there.

We organized her American Girl doll clothes and she agreed to let me pack them up and store them. I tried to get her to get rid of the Bitty Baby teeter board that never worked and she informed me that they don't make those any more and people on E-bay would buy it. I jumped on that and said, "Do you want to sell it on E-bay?" No, she was just saying that it could be sold on E-bay.

As I pulled out another tub filled with playskool toys, I sighed as I saw the classic school bus with little people. Like a wild animal my daughter sensed my weakness and said I'm absolutely not giving any of those toys away. So I was left to organized the array of toys and lovingly pack up the American Girl clothes. Mimi kept wanting to quit with the promise of finishing tomorrow. Yea, right.

She disappeared for a few minutes and again my hopes soared as I imagined that I could get rid of her "miscellaneous toys" and maybe a few stuffed animals without her knowledge. Unfortunately I was not as fast as her. Mimi came down with a chair and a book and said, " I'm not going anywhere until you're finished. Otherwise you'll sneak stuff into the garbage."

I succeeded in filling one bag of recycling garbage consisting mostly of American Girl boxes and lovely homes made from cardboard boxes and shoe boxes. Mimi relinquished one (ugly) cabbage patch baby with shoes and a dress, a hair salon kit, a little people's van, a few dress up clothes, and Ken with clothes. Even at that I saw her eyeing them and immediately called Doug to haul the things that were leaving the house out of the house.

We ended up arranging and condensing items into fewer containers. I dressed all the Barbies. Mimi wheeled around the Volkswagen and I the playskool bus. We tried on the black wings, red cape, a black witches hat with a purple feather band, and a sorcerer's hat. Mimi shimmied into a medieval style dress that was child's medium. You could loosely say that it still fit her. Hopefully this Halloween will be cold and she will need a coat over that dress. I may bring the wings and sorcerer's hat to bed tonight. We'll see if there is any magic in those accessories.

If success can be measured in that we can now get around in the storage room without fear of tripping or impaling ourselves on some toy then we were successful. Did I declutter? Not really.

As Mimi and I walked upstairs she asked me if I really thought she would get rid of anything after seeing Toy Story 3. I'm not taking that girl to any more movies.