Floored by kids’ out-of-favour, discarded toys

A designated room, storage areas, and recycling will contain the trail left by play, says Kya deLongchamps.

I CAUGHT my eight-year-old ‘tidying up’ — wistfully decanting dozens of exploding boxes of obsolete toddler booty into my recently cleared-out closet.

She was assembling a museum of childhood on my pinched avenues, creating space in her garret for the Christmas of more-to-come. I got up on my hind legs. Stunned at my gene-level selfishness, she selected one, tiny, sacrificial plastic doodah (which had been found on the floor at playschool and thrown into a drawer for four years).