Proof that Abbie is growing up fast
There's been a couple of significant events in Abbie's (and our) lives in the last couple of weeks. First of all, Julie and the kids spent two weeks down in Florida at the beginning of May. Julie's mom has a pool, so the kids enjoyed swimming in it almost every day. They've both been taking swimming lessons, but they certainly couldn't swim by themselves. Julie taught Abbie to do an underwater breaststroke rather than doggie paddling after the first few days. By the time I arrived (a week after their arrival), Abbie could swim all by herself, underwater. By the end of the week, she could swim from one end of the pool to the other. Pretty impressive I must say.
The 2nd event I learned about on Friday night. Sometime last week, Julie decided to start giving Abbie money to do chores around the house. She can only earn a maximum of $1 per day, but she's super pumped about it and is always asking if she can do stuff. Her room is usually spotless now. With her new found wealth, she needed something to store it in - so Julie bought them piggy banks over the weekend. Who knows how long their enthusiasm will last, but I think it's important to teach them how much things cost and how they can save money to get things they want. When I was a kid, I had a lot of chores and earned something like $5/week. While I didn't like the chores, I loved the allowance. It's good to see inflation hasn't influenced allowances too much. 
BTW, the genesis of the allowance was two-fold:
1. My kids ALWAYS wanted to buy a toy or candy at the store. When I started adding it up, it was like $10-20 a week. Yikes! I realized that the concept of money was abstract to my kids, so I implemented allowance and seeded it. Now, when they want something, I tell them they have to use "their money". They immediately formed a relationship with money. Boy A spent money about 25% more frequently than Boy B. Well, until the end of the year when Boy A realized he had a LOT less than Boy B (look at point 2 below to understand why). Now, they both save about 90%.
2. I wanted to reinforce the value of saving money, so I introduced the concept of "extra money"...basically, interest. Every week, after they get their allowance, they get interest. Well, 10% a week begins to add up fast, and by the end of the first year, one child outspent the other and ended the year with about $100 less. After discussing the power of compound interest, they both determined that they would save to get as much "extra money" as possible. A great life lesson.
Posted by Dennis Graham on June 05, 2007 at 05:14 PM MDT #