Putting My Foot Down

It was so simple. Maybe too simple.

After a full day at the office, making dinner, giving baths, and reading bedtime stories, all I wanted was a glass of wine and a long soak in a hot tub after my daughters went to bed for the evening. I had already started the bath water and went to retrieve my book from the family room. I was hurrying across the carpet to get it when a searing pain shot between my toes.

As I looked down, I could already feel blood trickling. I felt a bit faint after catching a view of something much pinker than me sticking out of my skin. I gingerly reached down to pull it out and was unpleasantly surprised to find a Polly Pocket with my DNA on it.

That was it — the last straw. I was tired of plastic torture devices declaring war on my feet. Barbies, My Little Ponies, and Polly Pocket figures could be found in every nook and cranny of the family room, thanks to the "nesting" instinct enjoyed by my then-3-year-old daughter, Brittany.

I was also tired of spending an hour each evening picking up and sorting toys — all so my girls could dump them all back on the floor to recreate the same mess the next day. But since my children were still so young, I didn't think they could help clean. But then I realized I could turn cleaning up into a game. I began by gathering all the matching toys and finding an appropriately-sized bin to store them in. Then I used my digital camera to take a picture of each set of toys and attached the pictures to the front of the bins. Within an hour, I had most of the toys sorted and stored in the visually-marked bins.

But the real test came the next day, when I told my daughters it was time to clean up. Normally, they would start whining about how it was too hard for them to clean or they were too tired to help.

But not this day. Instead, the girls raced around trying to collect all of the toys for each bin. They actually bickered about who could pick up the most toys. Within a few minutes, the family room looked like a toy-free — and foot-safe — zone.

Not only did the room get clean with little effort from me, but the exercise also helped the girls learn about grouping and sorting. And I could safely look forward to taking a relaxing bath after another long day — just as soon as my foot healed.