Afternoon Agenda

I have been in a bit of a quandary as of late. Concerning toys, but of course. Up until now, we have pretty much had "community toys". Aside from the first day after receiving a new gift, everything was up for grabs - first come, first serve. Great way to teach sharing. But I worried that I was not also teaching the very important lessons of "asking permission for things that do not belong to you" and "taking extra special care of those items". Also older boys like their newly configured toys to be left somewhat intact. Quite impossible with little, curious and eager hands around.

So I have decided Legos and Playmobils can be personal toys. Legos are pretty easy - most are Brennan's, and Philip and Nicholas each have a set they purchased last week with their own money. Playmobils are presenting a problem.

I thought that the boys and I could divide up their sets. After all, we knew who each set "belonged" to. But the individual pieces in each set? Very much under dispute right now.

So I, as judge, have decided to spend the afternoon looking up parts lists on the internet and correctly assembling each set.

If this doesn't settle any disputes over Playmobils for the next few weeks, I may just throw them out! Would that be so horrible?