I’m starting to doubt that my kids are being raised correctly.
I starting to believe that my kids (really all of our kids) are not being raised the most optimally as possible!
Why do I use the word optimally? Because our kids are raise much better than some countries and overall, they have a very easy life. But in a world where kids watch that very influential educator Mr. TV, are they really learning developing a sense of what is important in life?
Are we molding our children’s mind based on the teaching of the very influential Sponge Bob? Are they learning to be goofy goobers?
What if we readers, were also raised as goofy goobers, but in a different generation? Now we have a society of older goofy goobers teaching kids to be new goofy goobers, by letting them watch mind numbing shows similar to what we watched as kids… No wander immigrants are more inclined to become entreupenuers that the local born population.
But even more importantly than restricting the amount of TV they watch, are we teaching them on how to be responsible and helping them to develop skills? Currently, my kids don’t do any chores at all. I’m starting to think this may be spoiling them. Perhaps they believe that things should just magically happen for them? I think that if all they experience growing up is good times, then when they are an adult, life may be difficult for them. Any mild downturn, may confuse and frustrate them. Will adult life be disappointing and unfulfilling for them? Perhaps a little pain growing up make the pain later in life more manageable?
While nothing has caused me to write about this topic, it does have me wondering if I’m doing the best job of teaching and raising them as I possibly can.
I’m don’t have a manual for what to do, so I try to give an equal balance of things that I think are important for them and their growth.
Ironically, I believe I have a good grasp around the financial teaching… it’s the other stuff I’m worried about! This seems to be opposite to the general population.
As a father of 2 children (9 year old boy and a 6 year old girl), I always thought that “Fathers Day” was about me! Ordering the kids around on Fathers Day … “Hey son, get me the paper” or “Daughter, get me my slippers” almost seemed like that thing to say. Afterall, it’s my day and I’m in charge (imagine my evil laugh… Mwahahahaahhaha). Of course, I’ve never do that, but I can see where Dads could easily assume that’s what Fathers Day was about. But yesterday (much like when the Grinch’s heart grewing 3 sizes that day), I’ve come to realize that Fathers Day is about my kids and the memories we can create together.
I want my kids to look back and think of me with fond memories someday, and if I do this parenting thing right, I get to enjoy the experience along the way too ;). So from now on, Fathers Day will be about me trying to create some great memories on that day with my kids. And that is what I did this Fathers Day!
Here is my list of our frugal Fathers Day activities.
Opened my Fathers Day present, which was a new portable Fire Pit (Dad acted reasonable excited)
Went to pickup McDonalds breakfast for the kids
With help from the entire family, we moved our old furniture back into the Family Room, letting my son and daughter help with moving and decision making
Packed up and went swimming at the grandparents.
Swam as certain monsters (shark, blob and Orca).
Was an Orca Daddy to my younger daughter. And let the kids ride on the Orca
Watch Kids play as a trainer and dog trying to learn to swim.
(Helped Grandparents with some manual labor, digging and moving dirt took at least an hour… yuck)
Let son take 2 small wheelbarrows of dirt to dirt pile.
When home and kept an eye on my son while he started up the fire pit (we got the wood for free from grandpa)
My wife made pizza pies to cook over the fire pit.
Daughter and I weeded and water the flower bed (from mother’s day)
Son cooked the pizza pies over the firepit
We all at the pizza pies and toasted marshmallows.
Son and Daughter threw the ball for our dog to chase (until the dog got tired and stopped).
The kids and dad went on a lightning bug (or firefly) hunt. We caught about 15 lightning bugs and put them in a bug container for my daughter to watch at night.
Played with kids right before they went to bed.
And that was my Fathers Day, other than the McDonalds meal, it was a very frugal Fathers Day, but one filled with fond memories. Its funny how watching my kids playing or working reminds me of Normal Rockwell scenes… except better!
In my mind, I took so many great photos of the kids doing various things today!
This was by far the greatest Fathers Day I ever had!!!
In the classic tale “A Christmas Carol” by Charles Dickens, Ebenezer Scrooge was rich because he was extremely frugal (miserly really). So frugal that he never gave to charity, and was always out to save a buck. I know that this is just a story, but truth be told, most rich folk aren’t like this, the statistics back me up on this. But I’m not going to talk about the frugality and amount of charity that the rich dole out (as interesting as that is).
I want to bring to highlight another aspect of the character Ebenezer Scrooge. That characteristic is his loneliness and lack of real friends. In the story, his newphew would stop by at his uncle’s place and invite him to a Christmas party every year. But Scrooge would bah humbug it off and not go. I started wondering, what is the cost of missing an annual parties like that? Very high and here’s why:
The friends (you included) at the Christmas (or any) party will only be that way once at that time. It’s not replicatable. So if you have kids, they will only look, think and be (unique) that way at one time in life. You can never get that event back. If you were there at the party, you could be videotaping it for memories in later years. I wonder what the cost of such memories would be? The only way to really know is to ask someone older that missed them.
When you miss social events, you miss the opportunity to network. But really, that should only be 10% of the reason you would go to such an event. Go because your like people! Go because life is more than the perceived piece of paper in your wallet/purse.
Believe it or not (depending on the party composition), most likely you will learn something new at the party. Where I live, we have neighborhood parties, and at the minimum I learn at least 1 new thing at each and every party.
Why I’m writing this is because I missed a 2000 New Year’s Eve party because I had to be on-site at my company (I’m a techie). The funny thing is if you aren’t there, you really don’t know what you missed (but you did!).
So what I’m saying is “Don’t miss out on life”, there are more important things that just work and money. Do the Carpe Diem thing and “grab life by the horns” when you have the opportunity.
Christmas was always a special time for me as a kid!
Christmas Tree
It was my grandmother use to make it a very special time of the year. She went all out, she had a large Santa that stood in a sleigh decoration with individual reindeer that she would put on the top of her organ. Beneath the Santa decoration, she had a sheet of white foamy material that looked like snow.
The Christmas tree was put up with silver garland, special fancy homemade ornaments, silver tinsel hanging perfectly straight, and about 3 strings of lights (my grandfather hated to get them working every year). She also put decoration throughout the house, it was magical when I was a small boy. On one special gift for each person that she bought a gift for, she would wrap it so that it would create a wintry or Christmas scene (this was a lot of work).
Most years, my grandfather would go and buy a real fir-tree when I was younger, so the room that the tree was in would have a faint pine tree smell. My grandmother use to play Christmas songs (O Christmas Tree, Here comes Santa Clause, Silent Night, Rudolph, Frosty the snowman, etc) on her organ and we would sing some of the songs together. I was a great time! So, now that I have kids, this is a hard act to follow, but I wanted to do something.
So I decided to start a new family tradition.
On a whim, when my son was 1 and 1/2, we decided to buy a real Christmas tree instead of using an artificial one like I’ve had since I became an adult. Close to where we live is a large family owned tree farm. So I decided to give it a try…, and to my surprise, I was very impressed!
While we could buy a cut Christmas tree there, they also gave you the option of taking a saw and sled and cutting down your own Christmas tree. And this is exactly what I did that first year. Then when we went in to pay for it, we encountered another great surprise. They had Christmas music playing, and had a bunch of chair around an open hearth stove. They then sell popcorn, cookies and hot chocolate. So that is what we did! And to top off everything, they usually have 2 real reindeer in a fenced in area just to add a bit of extra Christmas flavor. It’s truly a great experience!
Since that first year, we have been doing it that way ever since. Now, my son and daughter alternate picking the tree every year making it that much more fun. This year, we are going to take our dog too. We usually wait for it to snow before going to pick out the tree (this is tough sometimes, because we don’t always get snow in December).
Now, you are probably wondering how much my newly created “family tradition” cost… Well since we usually go with the more expense fir trees, so in total, it costs me about $60.00. It’s one of the few times during the year that I’m a spendthrift 🙂
It’s worth it though… Oh, I forgot to mention that on the way to the tree farm, we play Christmas music in the car with the kids singing the songs… It’s a very Norman Rockwell-like experience. Using this activity, I’ve been able to recapture some of the Christmas spirit I encountered as a small child, and hopefully made it magically the same way for my kids.
