Opinions Please

SO, there is a box. The contents of this box have not been seen in FIVE YEARS (actually 5.5 almost)-- So, what do you do with the box? Do you just toss it, without going through it, because after all, if you haven't needed it in 5 years, then you must not be missing it. Do you go through it, because you never know there could be something of value in there? Do you keep it, and just deal with it later?

What's your opinion?

How about baseball cards... do you think that collecting baseball cards is a good thing, an annoying thing, serves a purpose, just creates more clutter? When should one actually part with ones baseball cards? Or should just hold on to them until you die and pass them down to the next generation?

How about toys? Should you keep toys to pass down? Should you purge them and give to less fortunate? Should you have an organized system for storage of toys?

Now about clothing... should you purge twice a year? Once a year? Should t-shirts have sentimental value and need to be kept until you pass and someone with no value attached tosses it for you?

I ask all of this, because, I want to do some serious purging. I'm so ready to just take a garbage bag and start tossing items. Now, I know I stand to receive great opposition from 2 in my family... Mr. Perfect and my first little princess. The prince and the littlest princess could care less.

As it stands today... toys are being purged. A trash pile, a charity pile, and a keep pile. With the littlest princess about to turn 1 and then Christmas being right on the heels of that celebration, it is high time to purge the toys and make some room. When I get paid next week, I'll be heading to Target for storage bins for all of the different toys that we are keeping. Everything is getting a label and getting put in a place. And hopefully we will get a nice system that we can all live with. My last system, no one paid attention too, and the mess is worse than ever. I can't take it much more. I don't like STUFF cluttering up my house.

And that brings me to my second portion of this Poll of sorts:
What do you want your children to receive for Christmas this year?
These are my leanings this year:
Daughter #1
A new, bigger bike, with training wheels
Barbie items and storage
Son
An arm chair for his play room
Hot Wheels/Matchbox cars and storage
Daughter #2
A Britax Marathon car seat
I have no clue what to get her for a toy!

All of them will get winter coats, hats and gloves, as well as clothing.

Now when people ask me what I want for my children for Christmas, that is a very tough question for me to answer. I don't want more junk. I want to control the amount of toys coming in the house, as I don't want to have a house overflowing with toys that don't get played with. So, when people ask, I am tempted to answer: money towards a family membership to the Children's Museum (a gift that gets used ALL YEAR LONG in our house), swimming lessons, movie tickets (for the oldest child)-- you know, things that my kids can USE that don't take up space in the house. I would think other mothers would agree with this. A gift card to Barnes and Noble is TWO gifts in one! They get to GO to the book store and leisurely peruse the books and then they get to pick on to take home. They love it! Granted, my kids have more books than their bookcase can hold, and we probably need to look at purging their too... but there is where my problem lies. I can't seem to let go of a book (children's books)-- I want to pass them down, generation to generation. I need to let go of that, and start giving these books to schools and hospitals that could really use them.

Well, lots to do today. Purging toys. Wish me luck. I'm ready to get this done!