Stuffed Animals

My boys are only 15 months old...and already we have plenty of stuffed animals! I am a sentimental person, and can not part with them...yet. Not to mention, I don't think they are really aware of them either, so I'd hate to get rid of them and then they love stuffed animals all of a sudden! Whenever they have gotten one..they EACH got one-the SAME one. So I have double of every stuffed animal. What in the world do you do with them? Do you pack them away for a later date? I am thinking of just throwing them into a rubbermaid container for quite some time and putting them in the closet! I suppose I could put them in the bouncy thing they have and let them go to town. I don't know!

What do you/did you do with them all? They keep multiplying! :lol:

 

I swear our pile multiplies like rabbits! We just took 2 garbage bags full of them to our local fire station before Christmas. They said they pass them out to little kids at fires or on ambulance runs.

 

I am having the same thoughts... I just started putting them in a big bin in their room. And tonight I had them help me "put the animals to bed for night-night." They of course will empty them all out, every day, which is fine, so I'm hoping the little routine instills a bit of a "helpers" attitude in them.

 

We have a bookshelf (in a pretty big/deep bookcase) devoted to them. The bookshelf is now full, and my rule is that if one comes into the house, another one has to go out. It's hard to let go of them -- and sometimes the girls will volunteer to get rid of one and I say "No, not that one!" -- but honestly, they can never play with them all.

 

We have the same problem here. Most of them are in toy bins in various rooms in the house (i.e. playroom downstairs, family room on main level). Some of them are in their cribs. I have told my family NO more stuffed animals please! They have plenty until they start asking for a particular animal/character.

 

You can buy a net (about $10 from TRU) that hangs in the corner of their bedroom and put all the stuffed animals in there. I did that for DD for her first 3.5 years. At that point, however, she was asking for so many, so often, it was pointless to keep putting them up there. I bought her one of those pop up hampers with a princess theme, and we keep all her stuffed animals in there.

Another thing I have done is buy a length of 1" chain from a hardware store and hang it from the ceiling in the corner. If you put a ribbon around the "neck" of each animal, you can hang them from the chain.

I also go through my kids stuffed animal collection and weed out the ones that don't have much sentimental value. If their collection gets too large for the net, or now her bin, my mission is to weed it down so they all fit again. Now that my DD is 4, she helps me. I tell her we're going to give some of them away to other little kids that maybe don't have any stuffed animals of their own.

My boys don't have nearly as many stuffed animals, but they're getting close! Isn't it fun! :huh:

 

Stuffed animals are taking over my house! I have to weed out frequently or it's just crazy! I like to bring some to our local animal shelter- they give them to the puppies to snuggle with in their kennels. Sometimes I give a bag to my friend who is a techer- she gives them out to her students as rewards.

My advice is to get rid of any one that you don't like now, before they get attached.