I hate stuffed animals

I'm just venting. I hate stuffed animals! They take up so much space and there are only one or two they actually play with. I'm having a hard time getting rid of them though because most of them were gifts. Sigh...

 

I was thinking. . .for your scaredy cat. . .they have little lights at Ikea, for $13.00 that don't get hot and can be unplugged and carried around. And they're in the shape of ghosts, so maybe it can be a good ghost? And they change colors too!!

spoka

 

I agree. Everytime Grandma (MIL) shows up with another stuffed animal I wanted to scream NOOOOO. At least that what I'm screaming in my head, but one day it might slip out :FIFblush: . It seems like they are multiplying and I also hate to get rid of them because the gift giver may realize they are missing.

 

I feel your pain Beth. AND probably like you, we have doubles of almost all of them. I haven't been able to get rid of any of them either because they were gifts, someone played with it once and it was so cute, they do play with it occassionally, etc. So I compromised a bit by packing some of them into a box and putting them upstairs in storage. Amazingly they didn't notice, but then again we still have a ton of them in their room and the den. I realize this is as much my issue as a problem with gifts. I get very attached to stuff from their babyhood.

 

I just had to suck it up and let go. When we packed to move a few years ago, I only brought one big box of stuffed animals with us. The rest went to goodwill. Now that all five will be in school in August, I'll be letting them each pick maybe 2 that they want to keep and the rest have to go.

 

It's kinda funny because I specifically asked my MIL to get them some for their birthday because they didn't have many, lol. We have 10 or so, it's a good number.

 

My Ava LOVES them. I HATE them!! everytime she sees one at the store she falls in love with it! and what is worse is that my 3 sons LOVE to play those STUPID crane machines and they know Ava's love for stuffed animals so they BEG to play the crane machines to win Ava a prize - UHG!!! I know Ava would know if I even moved one around in her room - and to get rid of them would be like getting rid of a piece of her so I am stuck for now! I avoid the stuffed animal section like the plague!

 

Same problem here. The ones that are definitely tied to a holiday (we have an *absurd* number of stuffed rabbits!) I pack up except for the 2 weeks before and after that holiday. I generally discourage people from giving them any more now, since they don't play with the ones they have. And then my mother brought over the ones of mine she had kept. :headbang: Luckily when they moved from TX to KY I was able to get her to send all the ones I didn't even remember to Goodwill.

 

Ugh, I hear you. DS has a couple favorites, and that's fine. DD has a ton and never plays with them. DH & I call them her entourage. They MUST be in her crib at all times, so she has a mountain of stuffed animals that takes up almost half of her crib (and then on top of that she has a pile of blankets lining one side of the crib), so she sleeps at crazy angles all mushed up. She probably has maybe 1/2 - 1/3 of the crib free to actually sleep in. And heaven help you if you try to move anything. :faint:

 

I saw this in a magazine & it's worked well for keeping our stuffed animals together. We took a shelf on their bookshelf & screwed in strips of elastic down the front. Prob about 4 inches apart. It's supposed to look like bars in a zoo. Turned out very cute & b/c the elastic is stretchy it actually holds quite a few animals!

 

I agree, stuffed animals are useless. Thankfully we don't have too many. One dd definitely has an affection for soft, cuddly things though. She would be hysterical if I got rid of any.

 

I hate them too but grandma and grandpa notice when any disappear. We ended up getting these:
http://www.leapsandbounds.com/catalog/product.jsp?productId=536392&cm_ven=Froogle&cm_cat=NA&cm_pla=NA&cm_ite=20049

Each girl has one and they are actually pretty comfortable. They like to sit on them and read/be read to.

 

My son Jake is the same way. He'll take one out (lately it's his hop, hop - rabbit) and if he forgets to bring it back to bed with him...watch out. Does not matter he has 1,456,909 other animals with him.

At least at 2 1/2, I can get rid of them and they really don't notice. My bil and his wife are always buying them those giant, 2ft stuffed animals. For their birthday, they got a Snoopy and Sponge Bob. They have NO idea who Snoopy & Sponge Bob are and they ended up in the Goodwill bag with a bunch of their other stuffed animals. Luckly for me, not many people come in their room or upstairs playroom.

Whenever people try to pawn off their stuffed animals on us, I tell them we have more than enough.

 

Remember the FlyLady's rule: "Just because it was a gift does not mean you have to keep it." :laughing:

That said -- we have a huge number of stuffies too. I keep them in one of those collapsible mesh laundry hampers, and that at least keeps them contained. If they start to overflow the hamper, I sneak a few out of the bottom (but none that they're truly attached to) and toss them.

I don't think I've ever actually purchased a stuffed animal (though DH has ). They were nearly all hand-me-downs from my SIL who gets her kids to let go of things by giving them to us. Now I do the same thing to my other SIL whose kids are younger! :spiteful:

 

I have a play room with a sofa in it and I put it at an angle in one corner and threw the army of stuffed animals behind it. The corner nook behind the sofa is now the girls' favorite spot to go hide and swim in the stuffed animals, and I don't have to see them or try to keep them contained. Yes, they jump off the back of the sofa occasionally, but they land on the cushy animals that are five-deep and the random pillows that have found a home back there also.