Survey: Children's Collections

When we were kids, it was rocks. We collected your garden variety rocks, but treated them like gems. We would pore over the entire backyard and find the best rocks and would them wash and dry them and put them away in a VCR tape box. (Yeah, we don't know why we picked a VCR tape box either...)

What do your children like to collect? Please share!

Image: Good Question: Storing Kids' Collections.

Comments (9)

Rocks. Go figure.

posted by herz9160 on September 12th 2008 at 6:02am
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Rocks. My husband and I are worried he'll ask for his rock collection back at 18 --- we tend to 'drop' them...

posted by AnneMarieL on September 12th 2008 at 6:21am
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What is it about rocks?! I guess they're a classic, huh?

posted by Alex on September 12th 2008 at 6:31am
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My son is a pack-rat so the list of collections includes (but is not limited to) rocks, shells, bookmarks, Kinder Surprise toys, fancy erasers, scraps of paper, pencil stubs and the computer print-outs listing the books he's borrowed from the library. At least he's stopped saving pencil shavings.

But I have a question: where did you get the cute jars?

posted by Northern Homebody on September 12th 2008 at 11:08am
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jars look like they're from pottery barn kids? very cute.

another rock-collecting household here. and hot wheels cars.

posted by selena on September 12th 2008 at 1:02pm
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Selena, thank you. Lots of Hot Wheels at my house too.

posted by Northern Homebody on September 12th 2008 at 1:42pm
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I live with the ultimate 10 year old pack rat. He seems to be the only one out of se7en to have the bug so badly. All things natural: stones (I drew the line at rocks), pebbles, bark, shells, leaves, pressed flowers. All things crafty: erasers, tiny pencils, pens, highlighters. Endless scraps of paper: every piece of gift wrap, every envelope, every little letter from the tooth mouse. Toys: matchbox cars, beanie babies, mini plastic animals. Anything dragon. Oh I could go on!...

posted by se7en on September 13th 2008 at 2:30am
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I have a budding pack-rack on my hands, as well. Which is excruciating for me, as I'm such a minimalist. Her most recent collection seems to be scraps of paper with "Dear Name, I love you. From Me." scrawled across them in her wiggly 5 year old printing. I stumbled across an entire coffee can full of these scraps the other day. Super cute...but where does it end?? I have a picture of her craft area from last week. I literally had to wade into a pile of scraps 3-4 inches deep before I could start cleaning.

Her collection is definitely craft stuff.

She also has boxes full of random bits of nature. Leaves, rocks...but mainly dead flowers and dandilions.

posted by Speakaboo on September 15th 2008 at 6:48am
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My kids are older so it is currently Lego for my son and turtles.Bella Sara cards and horses (Mini whinnies and schleich) for my daughter. We try to keep their collections in order so they have room.

We do have a pretty hefty rock collection though. I would honestly say a good 50% of the rocks are actually mine. I just find rocks interesting. Currently they are housed in my coffee table (it has a shadow box drawer under a glass surface). Otherwise they live in a box that has compartments.

posted by teawithsteph on September 15th 2008 at 11:58am
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