Clutter? What Clutter?

Those of you who know me know that I'm a neat freak. Okay, these days maybe I'm more of a lapsed neat freak, but you get the point. I like cleanliness. I hate clutter.

So, this weekend, I went on a cleaning binge at home.  Imagine my delight when my little helper Anna decided to keep me company. She decided - spontaneously, with no coercion from me - to clean her room. What a proud moment!  Anna was pretty proud of herself too.

And she did a great job.  So great, in fact, that the next day when playing with her friend Izzy (you may know her as Kitty EyE), Anna decided to clean her room again.  I figured she was simply picking up the toys she and Izzy were playing with.

Well, as it turns out....not so much.

Here's a picture of Anna's "clean" room:

Immediately, I noticed that something was off. I didn't realize "clean" was merely synonymous with "empty."  Then I opened the door to our bedroom and saw this:

That's right, Anna cleaned her room by transferring just about everything she owns to our room.  We went from this:

To this:

After the initial shock, I couldn't help but laugh. And this makes me feel much better about the need for the Excess Toy Fairy to visit Anna's room one night while she is fast asleep in order to (a) share some things with kids who really need and want them and (b) make room for Christmas presents.

So, next time your child offers to "clean" her room, it's okay to let yourself feel a sense of pride and accomplishment....but you might want to check on her, just in case.