We all know the classic plight of last-born children everywhere. Their scrapbooks are half as thick as their older counterparts and their time with mom and dad is lacking if it’s compared to what the oldest, once “only,” child enjoyed.

I was the baby of the family, so I know. By the time I came along, or at least, by the time I was old enough to remember, my family, including my two older brothers, had already done all the big stuff: Disneyland, Luray Caverns, New Mexico, Grand Canyon — do I have to go on? I grew up hearing about these family trips that I had either missed or was too young to remember.

The same is true for my youngest son, Lindell. Family trips came to an abrupt stop once we were dragging along three little people. In fact, it took me nearly five years to realize that Lindell had never even been to a zoo. And as soon as his older brothers were entangled with school calendars and sports schedules, our travel time and day trips were restricted even further.

Lindell, of course, has heard all the stories of what he missed.

But there is another problem for last-borns that no one seems to talk about: for all the flimsy scrapbooks and memories, your room becomes the dumping ground for everyone else’s childhood stuff.

Every time my older boys outgrew pants, books or toys, those things were ushered to their youngest brother’s room, where they sat until he was old enough to enjoy them or wear them. Fair enough.

But because Lindell is the youngest, sometimes we forget that he has outgrown some things of his own, if “hand-me-downs” can be called “his own.” In fact, by the time Lindell was in elementary school, “hand-me-downs” seemed so five years ago.

There’s an all but frantic rush to clean out the older kids’ closets to find things for their younger siblings, but when there’s no one else coming up behind you, all the family’s memorabilia waits in your room until someone notices that you can’t walk into your closet anymore.

That’s where we were last weekend. Lindell’s room had become a hodgepodge of the family’s old baby toys (actual infant toys), train sets (that no one plays with), and clothes (actual infant clothes). But Lindell is going on 10 years old. Were we keeping him in a holding pattern of babyhood, if for no other reason than because there is no younger sibling to pass things on to?

As much as my heart couldn’t bear it, I knew. It was time to purge.

The first round of discards were easy. Lindell parted willingly, eagerly, even with the baby toys that had filled his room since longer than he can remember. Bells and rattles chimed as I placed giveaway items into a box. Progress.

Then we got to the things he could remember playing with and I could remember him loving, and the process stalled. When room cleaning got to this point with Lindell’s older brothers, I just said, “You’re not saying goodbye to it, you’re sending it to your brother’s room.” Lindell didn’t have that option. The next stop for everything not sentimental enough to go into the attic was Goodwill, never to be seen again. And when you’re the baby of the family, letting go of your babyhood can be tough.

Lindell struggled and nearly cried a few times. But we were still making progress. Until his older brothers came into the room.

“You’re not sending MY childhood to Goodwill, are you?” Ford asked.

“You’re not giving away THAT, are you?” Owen said. “You’ve had that puppy since you were a baby!”

“My gosh, I feel like MY heart is going to break,” Ford said.

Suddenly Lindell was torn. He was second-guessing his choices and removing things from the giveaway pile.

And then my husband, Dustin, came into the room and said, “We have to let Lindell grow up. If you want to keep these things, take them to your own room.”

Silence.

Suddenly Ford didn’t care so much about the stuffed animal and Owen wasn’t griping about the sentimental value of a Darth Vader that had lost his leg.

Lindell bravely put more items into the giveaway pile and a few more in the to-the-attic pile. His eyes occasionally glanced at his brothers for approval. Ford and Owen bit their tongues. And then together Lindell and I took the giveaways to Goodwill. The attendant there let Lindell say his last goodbyes and she assured him that all his toys would find new homes. He was quiet on the ride home.

And I thought, he might be the baby, and his brothers might trivialize his strength and size, but he has had the hardest job of any of them: consciously marking the moment when the three of them grew up together.