We have a lot of Legos at our house. My husband is a big fan of Legos along with my son. I grew up with Legos but would probably come in third place, behind my husband and son, on the Lego Enthusiasm scale. Lego enthusiasm can be directly correlated with a desire to purchase more Lego sets. This is one of those skills my husband excels at. And having lots of Lego sets requires finding locations to store them after you’ve put them together.
I won't go into the discussions we’ve had over which models should be kept in their completed form, which should be taken down and stored as a set and which, after a period of post-assembly enjoyment, should be dismantled and added to the general collection of pieces. We also don’t need to go into the secondary discussion about which model should be displayed in the house—filling the dining room table for months—with no foreseeable plan for relocation and storage.
For the most part we have a harmonious relationship with Legos in our house, excepting when they’re left out and get stepped on with bare feet. But there does need to be some iterative cleanup over time. The “general use” Legos are stacked in a corner in six multi-drawer containers, sorted by color, wheels, and people. Over time my son and his friends make models using the pieces. They’re getting more creative as they get older with what they make, but in the end, they don’t break down the pieces and re-sort them back into their respective drawers. That part’s not nearly as fun.
I put a plastic bin on the top of the drawers for their completed or partially completed projects. Over time the bin gets full. They never seem to go back to the items in the bin to reuse them, they pull from the drawers to start over. I’ve requested that sorting happen from time to time, but the job only gets partially done.
My husband and I have a list of things we’re working on getting done at the house and, “figure out what to do with all the Legos” was on my husband’s list. This afternoon he started in on dismantling the Star Wars Star Destroyer and followed up with breaking down the White House, storing those models back in their boxes, destined for the attic.
I suggested we could have a family activity to sort the general use Legos. At this point the bin had overflowed beyond the boundaries of the corner of the room in which they were meant to be contained. My children could get “points” they could spend later for screen time if they helped and didn’t get distracted with all the pieces, building things instead of breaking them down.
Everyone agreed and after dinner we convened together on the floor of the bonus room. I had gone through the piles and what was in the overage bin and pulled out all the larger creations, setting them aside for my daughter. She has very little vision at this point and can’t tell colors, but she would be able to separate the larger creations into pieces.
We had a fun time doing it. My daughter really liked her job, saying, “I love my job.” My son was harder to keep on task, but he helped and got a good understanding of how to systematically sort and then store the pieces. And they were happy about it too, because they got three points each towards future screen time.
And for me? The best part is that heaping pile of Legos in the corner is now tidy and organized. That’s the part I like the best.
The Big Boy Update: My in-laws watched our children last night while my husband and I went to my son’s back to school adult social. While we were out, Nana and Papa went around the block with the children on their scooters. My son was well out ahead when Papa asked him didn’t he want to wait for his sister? He replied, “Reese is the cutest in the world…but I have to be first.”
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: We were outside late afternoon today when we had one of those impromptu meetings of adults while the children buzzed about us. I talked to my dentist neighbor about dentist things, we were joined by other neighbor and asked how their son was doing in college. Then my best friend’s husband and one of his daughters came by on their scooters and a bit later the conversation turned OBGYN related (as he’s an OBGYN) and someone said something involving, “IUD” in it. My daughter, who was near us climbing a tree, immediately shouted out, “I had an IUD but mine expired.” All the adults couldn’t help but laugh. My husband explained that my daughter’s Ident-a-kid ID had expired two days ago and he had told her about it.
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