Bad Idea - Good Idea
November 17, 2007 – 7:26 amI did something questionable yesterday in an attempt to help my six year old daughter about the value of money. I am not sure if it was successful.
So here is the situation in a nutshell… so walking home from school to the car my daughter likes to pick up colorful leaves to collect. So I suggested that we go and get a leave press that way she can keep the leaves in a nice neat package and add to them. On our way home we were going to find one. We stopped at Barns and Noble. Asked the help desk and the person told me “no, we don’t have anything like that.” Convinced that the store had what I was looking for I continued on with three kids to look. Without much trouble I was able to find what I was looking for. It was about $5, so we decided to get it - until Gabby saw a little reindeer toy. She brought it to me and asked if she could trade the leaf press for the reindeer because they cost about the same. (Aside, I had my two younger boys with me as well. They are four and two. They are in the stage where they want everything in the store.)
Frustrated, I said to her that we were going to put the leaf press back and weren’t getting the reindeer either. I tried to explain that we can for something specific and that if she didn’t want that we wouldn’t be getting anything. Understandably, she was trading something for the same amount of money, almost as if she was shopping and had $5 to spend. I tried to impress upon her that we were shopping for a specific item because it was something she liked to do, but if she didn’t want it more than a passing fancy - we didn’t need to get it.
How would you have handled it? Better yet, WWJD?
In retrospect, I feel bad about the way I handle it.
Tags: Family
One Response to “Bad Idea - Good Idea”
Hi Joe,
I’ve never heard of these leaf press things. When I was little, we’d take the leaves and stick them between to pieces of wax paper, put a towel over the paper, and iron them together. That way the leaves were pressed together and we could hang them in our windows!
With WWJD…hmmm…he probably would have taken the $5 and given it to the poor. Though I have to say, it sounds like your daughter was trying to be a “smart shopper” in not asking for something else that was more expensive. Perhaps one approach (and I can say this easily because I don’t have kids of my own yet) is to teach her how to shop for things outside of the store setting where stuff abounds and every young child wants just about anything. Teach her to ask herself questions about why she wants it, if she’d play with it for a long time, etc… (Ben had to teach me not to be an impulse shopper, so I can kind of relate.
).
As an aside, since you’re doing this blogging thing at the convocation, check out http://methoblog.com/. It’s got an updated Methodist blogroll along with all sorts of stuff for UMC bloggers!
Peace,
Melissa
By Melissa Yosua-Davis on Nov 17, 2007