The Toy Torture

I am about ready to go completely insane. I absolutly HATE the end of the day when it's time to pick up toys. I mean HATE. Ever since Asher was probably about 2 we've picked up toys almost every single night before bed. You would think we had this figured out by now, but we don't. Every single night it's torture. I do nothing but nag, nag, nag the entire hour it takes us. I am completely out of ideas on how to fix this. I've tried standing over them the entire time which just ends up in a whole lot of discipline with no better results. I've tried having them pick up several times a day so the mess isn't so big. That just results in having to nag, nag, nag several times a day instead of just once! A few weeks ago I got a new idea where I would just set the timer and when the timer goes off any toys that are still on the floor become mine. Now I just have a huge pile of toys in my room! I DO help them, but the only difference between me helping and not helping is that *I* end up doing all the work! I'm thisclose to just getting rid of all their toys. They obviously don't care about them and to be honest, I don't think they would really even notice. They'd still keep plenty busy. I don't want to have a "can't get a new toy out until you put the other away" kind of rule for multiple reasons. For one, sometimes you just need more toys to do what you want. YOu want to build a ramp with your blocks for your cars to go down. Or have your dinosaurs attack the Lincoln Log cabin. Or have the stuffed bear serve the pretend food dinner. I don't want to stifle them by limiting the number of toys they can play with at one time. I want them to be able to seamlessly move from one activity to the next, when they think of it without having to worry. I really don't mind not being able to walk through the living room throughout the day, I just hate the torture of getting it all picked up at the end of the day! I just don't know what to do about it anymore but I'm so tired of the fight every single night.