It is common courtesy for friends to help clean up after they have been playing at your house. I don’t mind cleaning up with my children when we are at a friends house, but sometimes it is very difficult because I don’t know where all their toys belong.
When I lived in Kansas I had a group of friends, and we would have a play group every week. We would rotate houses so everyone got a turn to “host the mess.” We would all fumble through putting the toys away and follow the lead of the person that lived there, and be constantly asking “Where does this go? Where does that go?” One day we went to one of our friends house for play group and she had labeled the toy tubs! SO SMART and yet, no one had done that yet! It made clean up so nice because all the mom’s knew where everything went. I went right home and labeled all of my tubs also! I now love it when people come over and by having my tubs labeled, I have helped them clean up my house! 🙂 Of course this is an ongoing process because we are often needing to add new tubs or upgrade to bigger tubs because we have expanded that certain toy collection, but it is worth it for an easy clean up after play dates!
FYI Yes I do have a miscellaneous tub, because it is impossible to group EVERYTHING! Also, if you wanted to add a simple picture of whatever the word label says, so the children who cannot yet read will also be able to tell which tub is for what toy that would be helpful, but I’m too lazy for that! lol
Donna says
This tub idea is wonderful. And, not just for kids!!