Tuesday, May 20, 2008

My $4.01 Starbucks card.......

A little history here: about 4 weeks ago Skippy was swinging a yo-yo ball around in the house. I had repeatedly told him to stop swinging it because he was going to break something. A few minutes later I hear glass shattering in the dining room. I look out there and sure enough, he has clobbered the light fixture with the yo-yo ball and broke one of the glass light covers and the lightbulb. In my finest "Love and Logic" moment ever, I did not yell at him! I told him to clean up the glass while I looked on line to see what it would cost to replace that fixture. It was determined that $12.50 was the replacement value and I sent him to get me his wallet. He had $2.44 in his wallet, so I took it all and started a running tally of monies owed to me for the replacement of the light fixture. Over the past month he pulled weeds and vacuumed my car for $5 to add to his repayment. This past weekend, his dad challenged him to climb to the top of a rock wall and the reward was a buck. As soon as he got home he gave me the dollar a payment towards his debt; bringing the balance owed down to $4.06.

Fast Forward:
This morning as we were rushing to get out the door I asked Skippy to help me by either A) getting Scoop's shoes on him or B) switching the laundry from the washer to the dryer. He chose the laundry. Pretty soon I hear him hootin and hollerin something about a Starbucks card. Immediately I knew that he had found MY starbucks gift card that I had mistakely left in the pocket of my shorts on Sunday, but the rule in in our house is that if you find money (or other valuables) while doing the laundry then it belongs to you (within reason!)...........so Skippy was then the proud owner of a Starbucks gift card with $4.01 on it.

He then remembers his debt to me and offers up his newly found windfall as final payment. I accept. And am now in possession (once again) of MY $4.01 Starbucks card and he is once again a debt free 8 year old.

5 comments:

Gina said...

I love that rule. I am the sole do-er of laundry so it hasn't turned around on me- yet.
It has made me be careful about where I set down my change. My off limits areas are in the little watering can in the laundry room- since that is all the change I have just emptied from pockets, my bedside table, my closet, and the docking station in the kitchen. Kids off limits places are thier lockers, the bins above thier lockers, and dresser tops. Anything else is fair game. If you find it laying around it is yours- all the kids have gotten a lot less cavalier about thier money lately.
I laughed about Ben's excitement over the Starbuck's card and the fact that you had to accept it as payment!
Good Parenting, Trish. I would have trouble remembering that a child owed me that money.

Melissa Lee said...

Well, hello Trish, my new bloggalicious friend. I actually wanted to leave a comment on the post above, about your sister and her "little friend" that she created. Uhhh...the spider freaked me out...until I saw the pic she posted of the Bubba teeth. Now this is a woman I have to meet. Poor Granny never saw that one comin', did she?

By all means LINK ME UP. And I would be more than happy to do the same for you, if that's okay?

You know we have the exact same taste in books I noticed. Both the Kite Runner and Captivating are, well, captivating. Hope to talk more soon.
Anyhoo - I was

Valerie said...

Aaaah an inspiration to all mothers. Make rule, stick it out and have a great story to tell later. Excellent.

Debbie said...

That kid has a future on Wall Street.

mer@lifeat7000feet said...

That is funny...though I might have cried if I'd had to give up my Starbucks card!

Yep, you can certainly link to me. Thanks for asking!

Meredith