Lessons

I owe the interwebs (read: me, for posterity’s sake) a recap and gush on my newly-minted FIVE YEAR OLD. But the photos are stuck on my camera and I have been recovering from our crazy weekend. Who woulda thunk a weekend at home would have put me me even more behind on everything?? Oh well!

But for now I just want to share an experience we had with the kids last night. Matt and I have lots of discussions about parenting. We’re like any parents, just trying to raise good happy citizens, I suppose. We’ve been talking off and on about how we will help them acquire the mundane skills for completely unsexy things like bill paying and budget keeping and I think we both rather thought it was a ways off. And yet … we had to stop by the pet store last night for hedgehog litter and treats (mealworms) and we found an earlier opportunity.

Matt was originally going to run in on his own to make the errand shorter, but Ben wanted to go see the array of small pet options for his turn to have his own pet next year when he is six (pending all money and responsibility commitments being met). And Matt joked that they should just go in on their own and we could stay in the car. Ben was thrilled by this idea, but Tabby balked. How could they, mere children be expected to go into the pet store on their own??!

I think Matt and I both innately tend to push back quite a bit when Tabby freaks out this much about something we consider to be well-within her abilities, so we decided then and there that it was time for her to conduct a store transaction … along with her little brother.

Under my direction, we had them get a cart to put the litter in. They didn’t know where to go. It was a new petstore to us and I didn’t know either, so I directed them to find someone to ask for help. Tabby freaked out, but Ben went right up to an employee and asked for the hedgehog litter. Though Ben’s speech is pretty distinctive most of the time, the request for hedgehog litter was not immediately intelligible to the employee and he had to repeat himself a few times. I was proud that he didn’t get frustrated or upset, he just asked twice more and she eventually was able to help him. We helped them select the hedgehog litter and get it in the cart (heavy!!) and then we encouraged Tabby to ask after mealworms. It was a struggle, but she managed it and I was proud to see she remembered to use her good manners.

When it came time to pay, we handed Tabby the cash and she worked pretty independently with the sales clerk to get the order processed. With just a little help from me, she was able to figure out what change she was owed and make sure she got it. Ben was thrilled to do a second transaction (minus the higher math) with some dog treats for Loki so he got the check-out experience too.

Tabby avowed the experience was terrible and hard and she never wants to do it again. Ben loved it and I’m pretty sure he wants to move out on his own next week. I’ll settle for something in the middle – giving them both some more opportunities to be independent in their world.