It occurred to me recently that Calder is a perfectly able bodied child, so able bodied that he is capable of doing light to moderate physical tasks. Like chores. As such I determined that is was high time to put him to work around the house. Isn't that what I had kids for, so I didn't have to do all the work myself? You totally said that to your parents at least once. Oh yes, you did.
Of course getting Calder to do anything that is not directly related to the playing of Super Mario Brothers is nigh on impossible so instead of wasting my time messing around with charts and twee little stickers I cut right to the quick and offered him an allowance, $.50 a week (I am a cheap-ass woman) for keeping his toys picked up in his room, the basement and the living room; helping Bruce empty the various trashcans and just not being a Mr. Destructo in general. He also gets an extra dime for being super helpful such as entertaining his sister while I cook and helping me to pick up her messes as well.
Not only is this allowance going to be a good motivator for him we are also using it to supplement his sporadic lessons on money and math. Plus, he is excited to have an income. So far he doesn't know all that much about money. He can identify certain coins on occasion and he maybe thinks that dollars and cents are the same thing but still, it's a step up from calling everything, even credit cards, "monies".
Calder's great plan at the moment is to save up enough to buy himself another wii game. He was a little down about the whole thing when I pointed out that he only had 100 cents and not 100 dollars and he'd need another 500 quarters to supplement the four he was waving around around. Mathematical reason alone was not enough to stop him from demanding we go to Target. Calder really, REALLY loves his wii lately. Thankfully the offer of cheese and crackers and the fact that Bruce had the only car was a much better deterrent.
What Calder doesn't realize is that I have been shoving spare change into his dino bank for the last four years so this allowance is actually a step down. Muwhahahah. If Calder works hard for his allowance perhaps I will take pity on him and let him use some of the bank money to get a game in exchange for allowing me to put the rest of his savings in his real interest earning account. At least one of us should have a non-embarrassing savings account.
Of course getting Calder to do anything that is not directly related to the playing of Super Mario Brothers is nigh on impossible so instead of wasting my time messing around with charts and twee little stickers I cut right to the quick and offered him an allowance, $.50 a week (I am a cheap-ass woman) for keeping his toys picked up in his room, the basement and the living room; helping Bruce empty the various trashcans and just not being a Mr. Destructo in general. He also gets an extra dime for being super helpful such as entertaining his sister while I cook and helping me to pick up her messes as well.
Not only is this allowance going to be a good motivator for him we are also using it to supplement his sporadic lessons on money and math. Plus, he is excited to have an income. So far he doesn't know all that much about money. He can identify certain coins on occasion and he maybe thinks that dollars and cents are the same thing but still, it's a step up from calling everything, even credit cards, "monies".
Calder's great plan at the moment is to save up enough to buy himself another wii game. He was a little down about the whole thing when I pointed out that he only had 100 cents and not 100 dollars and he'd need another 500 quarters to supplement the four he was waving around around. Mathematical reason alone was not enough to stop him from demanding we go to Target. Calder really, REALLY loves his wii lately. Thankfully the offer of cheese and crackers and the fact that Bruce had the only car was a much better deterrent.
What Calder doesn't realize is that I have been shoving spare change into his dino bank for the last four years so this allowance is actually a step down. Muwhahahah. If Calder works hard for his allowance perhaps I will take pity on him and let him use some of the bank money to get a game in exchange for allowing me to put the rest of his savings in his real interest earning account. At least one of us should have a non-embarrassing savings account.
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