Kids lining up toys

[nextbigthing]

DS will be 2 in a few weeks

He is speaking well, listens pretty well, etc

He seems to be obsessed with lining up toys. In the playroom that's all he wants to do, he takes his little people and small toys and lines them up or puts them all lined up in the back of his toy train, but then he doesn't drive the train or anything.

Same thing in the bathtub.

If his work gets messed up he gets very upset and will throw a tantrum.

I've tried to get him to play more (drive the truck, fly the airplane etc) but he doesn't seem very interested, he likes books and playing outside.

I've asked at school and they say normal. They said he plays great with the other kids and is very social.


Concern or a phase? I plan to talk to the pedi at his two years appt in two weeks.


Eta: should I try to modify his behavior and discourage him from doing that or just let him do his thing?

[sarahbear]

Not concerned.

[cinderbella]

I think this is super common. My girls were both in to stacking and sorting their toys - along the same lines as lining them up. It doesn't sound like there are any other red flags so I wouldn't worry.

[cjcouple]

Totally normal. My son loved the movie Cars when he was 2. He had all the little characters as a matchbox. He would sit by ottoman and line up all the guys/cars and copy the scenes when they came on as he watched it. He was too little to know how to play with them alone/independantly.

[Dezi]

I think it's a phase. DD did the same think for a year or so and then it suddenly stopped.

[ssmjlm]

Normal

[sweetchix]

DD1 did this all the time with her MLPs. I say completely normal, and a phase.

[Deleted]

My (now) three year old did this forever. He lined everything up and called it a train. It lasted probably a year and a half but he doesn't do it much anymore. He also liked putting fire trucks next to fire trucks, etc.

[tantek]

Not a concern.
Both my kids did this. I think it's a way of processing and learning. And nobody likes people messing up their work! ("The maker is the breaker")

[AHappierHour]

My DD1 did that with her my little ponies all the time and she is fine. She's almost 8.

[styme46]

My 4 1/2 year old still does this with his cars and planes. Totally normal.

[underwaterrhymes]

Super common. K did this all the time from around 20 months until maybe 2 1/2. He would even sort animals.

[underwaterrhymes]

Oh and definitely don't discourage it, regardless. He's learning and expressing himself through play. That's a good thing!

[ginandjucie24]

Normal. Abe would do this with al his toys. It drove me nuts, because everything had to lined up perfectly and in the way that he had it.

[clairedunphy]

All 3 of my boys lined up their toys.

[googled]

My kid does this aaaaall the time. And he gets super pissed when the dogs walk through with total disregard for the line and knock shit over.

I vote totally common!

[wambam]

I did this obsessively as a kid. I turned out normal ish and I'm just a very clean person.

[textbookcase]

Super duper common. All of my kids lined things up as toddlers. Don't discourage it, it's their way of sorting and grouping and classifying and making sense of the world!

[CloudBee]

Normal. I bet next he'll start sorting by color and type, too.

Kids this age usually love to mess up your block tower, etc., and flip out if you mess with theirs.

[iamgrace]

Totally normal.

[hopecounts]

This is a case of intensity duration and frequency.
Also in context.
If his teachers say he is normal and social I wouldn't be terribly worried if speech and social are ok.
I would be aware of it but not terribly worried yet.

[jsillyfun]

My DD did and I was a little worried but then she told me it was her "art" lol. Little installation artist.

[miso]

If this isn't normal, I have a highly abnormal child.

If anything, I've been impressed with the organization. LOL.

[VillainV]

C does this too. He'll be 3 in April and has been doing it for about a year. He doesn't always do it when he plays, but it's very common when he has a lot of a similar object (toy trains, toy dinosaurs, cars, etc). I think it's how he demonstrates that he recognizes that different items are in the same category.

[Kristinmo]

Another vote for normal. The number of times I was yelled at for disrupting his perfect lines was crazy. He is a normal 7 year old.

[chickadee77]

Phase.

I will also say that in our case, it has now escalated to, "No, Mommy. I'm lining up the GREEN ones!" or, "No! Only SQUARES!" etc. So I'm still hoping it's a phase.

[hisno1girl]

Phase.

My DD used to the same exact thing.

[Mrs. Meerkat]

Another normal vote.

DS is 3 and still does this. He's just starting to pretend in context. Like, he'll line up all of his cars and tell me they are ready to race. (But they never race.)

He'll also take his Pokémon figures and line them up in circles like they're having some sort of secret Pokémon meeting or something on random parts of the house.



ETA: just got up to get DS a drink and I see this:



Lol

[abs]

Yeah, this is a phase most kids go through I think. My DD certainly did. Her lining up got more and more elaborate and I actually was concerned (she had other red flags, too). Turns out I was worried about nothing and she grew out of it around 3. She's 6 now and has completely normal play skills.

[litebright]

Feb 5, 2017 12:30:43 GMT -5 hopecounts said:

This is a case of intensity duration and frequency.
Also in context.
If his teachers say he is normal and social I wouldn't be terribly worried if speech and social are ok.
I would be aware of it but not terribly worried yet.

Yes, I would echo this. 

Many, if not most, kids go through a phase like this. If he is social, otherwise typically-behaved, and you don't have concerns about his language, etc. then I would make a mental note and leave it at that. (I say this as a parent of an autistic child who had the lining-up habit as well.)

I wouldn't necessarily try to modify the behavior, either. Throwing a fit if your stuff gets messed up is not unusual for a lot of people -- but especially at two when you're starting to get a better handle on what "my stuff" and "messed up" mean and how to deal with the fallout of things not going exactly as you want.

If you do anything at all, rather than trying to prevent or distract him from lining stuff up, I would focus on his reaction and how you think you can use it as a small way to build resilience -- modeling an appropriate emotional reaction; reacting very little to emphasize that it's not the end of the world even if it feels that way to a 2YO; or focusing on his own ability to "fix" it; etc.