Don't ask me why on top of cleaning the house from top to bottom in the next week, I thought it would be a good idea to go through every item in the toy chest and make decisions, but I did. John agreed, and that's what the family did this evening. In the kids are driving me nuts category, everybody talked at once.

Who wants a pencil?
Is everybody done with this Buzz Light Year with one leg missing?
That's my rock!
Don't throw out the wooden sliced bread. I need that.

In the my kids are pretty cool category, we had basically no resistance to getting rid of toys that were crap to begin with and already broken or lost half their pieces (hello the dollar store and birthday party goody bags); toys that we had truly outgrown like the previously much beloved view finder; and toys that no one really liked but we had hung on to because of when and how they had entered our life like the rather stiff yellow bear my dear tenure committee at Highline gave me when I went on maternity leave.

We have half a garbage bag for Goodwill and half a garbage bag for the garbage. The drawers now close, the top is cleared off. Next step, David's room.