Rotating toys 18 month old

Some of you might remember my original post about rotating toys for Chase. Super mom and blog friend, Jen. Recently discovered the joy of toy rotation. We are both obsessed with the little stories blog and her toy rotation concept! Jen was asking me for advice on twitter which I love btw and it motivated me to reorganize.

I've been home with Chase for 2 weeks so things have gotten unorganized. My dad is watching him tomorrow and rain is predicted so I figured I better rotate the toys so they have "new" fun stuff to do tomorrow.

Things have changed a little from my first post too. In my first post Chase had a play area at every level of our tri level house. Now he pretty much hangs out on the main level. I recently cleared out the cabinet underneath our tv so there would be a place to put all his toys away. We try to make time after dinner and before bath for toy clean up time. Trying to get him in the habit now!

Since I hadn't rotated toys for a couple weeks a lot of the toys had migrated to the main level. So pickings were a little slim. Here's what he will wake up to tomorrow:

The top shelf is books. On the left are the 4 board books we checked out from the library the last time we were there. I always get 4 that way I know how many to search for when it is time to return. I put a couple board books and one regular paged book. I have to make sure my dad knows to watch Chase with the regular book so pages don't get ripped. Boys! Underneath that shelf is the thinking toys. A shape shorter, puzzle and connecting block things. Under that is the moving shelf a turtle that makes noise with balls in it, a basketball and that big thing on the ground is kind of like a keyboard. Bottom shelf is pretending toys a tractor, construction truck ramp, and a bear.

In the picture below you can kind of see where the cabinet is. It is under the tv.

Jen also asked for advice about storing the out of rotation toys. We have cabinets next to our bed and the one on my side of the bed is dedicated to the out of rotation toys. Top shelf is thinking toys (blocks, stacking rings, puzzles). Middle shelf is moving toys (bats, balls, musical toys). It also has some random stuff like my breast pump and a box of kleenex. Bottom shelf is books and pretending toys (stuffed animals, tool box, groceries, hats, a phone).

See, it is next to the bed. Most of his books are in here and I sometimes have that chair in there for me to put things away and Chase will get on it and pick out books to read in bed.

He is alseep right now so I'm not going to go in his room and take a picture of his bookshelf. We have two books from the library a mother goose book and a king arthur book along with two books we own on it. Those are his bedtime books that he gets to pick from to red before bed. Let me know if you have any questions on toy rotation or book rotation!

Tips and Tricks Tuesdays for moms

It's Tuesday! I told you I was bringing back Tips and Tricks Tuesdays for moms!

Today, I'm talking about toy rotation! I had heard about toy rotation on a blog I think. So of course when I saw a pin about it I had to pin it and was excited to check it out. The pin takes you to the Little Stories blog. The subtitle is early speech and language development. Which gets my little teacher heart so excited!

This is the best explanation of how to rotate toys. My short version is you categorize your toys into 3 categories. 1) thinking toys like puzzles, shape sorters, and stacking rings 2) moving toys like balls, instruments, and ride on toys and 3) pretending toys stuffed animals, phones, or at our house cardboard boxes. Then you pick 3 toys from each category and that is all they get to play with. Put the other stuff away and rotate every couple weeks. Easy peasy!

We have a tri level house so Chase (aka spoiled rotten brat) has three play areas. Before I organized his toys I did rotate things around and hide some things so he kept interested.

Here is his play area on our main level in the kitchen now. On the left is the pretending toys: carboard boxes, my breast pump bag that he likes to carry around and we call it a purse or satchel and his snake toy that he chases us around the house with. Then there are his thinking toys in the middle: blocks, a puzzle, and an apple from the very hungry caterpillar book that has a caterpillar and fruit in it. Then on the right are his moving toys: a ball, a keyboard, and his musical turtle with wheels.

You might have seen a tweet from me about @lilstoriesblog. You all need to follow her! She tweets about speech and language development stuff and gets back to you quickly which I love! She tweeted me and asked how toy rotation was going and I asked her what category that musical turtle with wheels that Annie and I have would be and she responded right away.

Here is Chase's play area upstairs. Thinking toys: the shape sorter turtle, puzzle, and stacking rings. Pretending toys: his puppy, the phone, and the construction ramp. Moving toys, bats, drum, and basketball hoop.

The play area downstairs. Moving toys: ride on fire truck, lawn mower, and ball. Pretending toys: his shopping bag with food, his workbench, and another phone. Thinking toys: puzzle, blocks, and the thing behind the lawn mower it has a shape sorter and different knobs and stuff to play with.

I had a lot of fun organizing his toys. Like I said it makes my heart happy to feel like he is learning while he is playing. I know we shouldn't compare our kids but when I read that Melissa's 13 month old can stack blocks I panic and start trying to get Chase to stack blocks.

Has toy rotation stopped him from going behind the tv or climbing on the coffee table? No. When he woke up from his nap and his toys were all organized he was excited to play with everything. Since I went through everything and made sure all the pieces were where they should be there were some things he hadn't played with in awhile.

I also leave board books out for him to read. He loves to have us read to him. I just separated them out so there are 4 or so in every play area.

Got any tips and tricks for moms? You don't have to be a mom. You could give hair tips because we all know I have serious mom hair. Write a post and link up!

Kid activities under age 1

I've been trying to come up with stuff to keep Chase entertained lately. He's so busy and his toys aren't entertaning him much. Last week we went to the park he can crawl around at twice and to the mall on a windy day and I let him crawl around in the kids play area. I was nervous he would get some disease that would put him in the hospital but he seems to be ok so far! I sanitized him afterwards.

We also did our first craft project!

Finger painting! I was looking for something like edible playdough but the ingredients like peanut butter are things he can't eat yet and I found edible finger painting. You just put a drop of food coloring in yogurt! Genius!

I put him in his high chair and gave him one color at a time to finger paint with. I didn't let it get too messy or crazy. This entertained him for about 10 mins. The grandmas both want one too so we will have to do it again soon!