It's spring (sort of)!
And with the changing of weather comes many, many jobs for the modern northern family including putting snow pants away and matching mittens together and finding a bin big enough to fit the various winter items until next season.
It is a super fun job.
Really fun.
I may have to do the winter clothes Marie Kondo style, throwing everything in a big pile in the living room and sorting through it. Except for the "finding joy" bit because no winter item will bring anyone joy at the end of the season.
Children have an uncanny ability to not recognize their own articles of clothing when they have fallen out of their hands and on to the floor. Toques, mitts, gloves, scarfs, snow pants, bicycle helmets, water bottles, pants, shoes, and boots, clog up the school lost and found bins to overflowing. I try to go through the lost and found at my kids school every month or so, collecting their miscellaneous items and find things that I did not realize they had "borrowed." (I'm talking to you, daughter. I found my missing scarf at your school - twice).
If this laissez-faire attitude about their clothes were consistent, then the lost and founds would be filled with McDonald's toys, Pokemon cards, Bey Blades and other favourite toys.
But there are no toys in the lost and found.
It must come down to value - they value silly, little toys and I value not having to buy new gloves. People need to go through lost and founds more often as you can find a number of treasures that no one will touch. I am fairly certain that there are enough water bottles at schools, dance studios, gymnastic clubs, and martial art dojos to quench the thirst of all Prince George.
As it is, I think that after an appropriate amount of time, people should feel free to dig through the lost and founds in the search for something useful - or something you used to own. Then when your kids "misplace" something, you can be content in the knowledge that the things they've lost have gone to a good home.
That's what I hope, anyway.
In the meantime, I will be sorting through mittens and toques to see what may work next year and deciding what to do with the eleven single mitts that are leftover.
