Indulgence will ruin a child. In my almost 13 years of parenting I have learned (and am still learning) to control what my children receive during non-gifting events. When we go to Chuck E Cheese, they get a set number of tokens and when they're gone, they're gone. I do not say "yes" to every play date or fun event that appears to us. My kids need to learn the idea of moderation in order to control their spending and impulses when they're adults.
This weekend I met Kim, who is the mother of Jeremy, one of Isaiah's friends. Jeremy rallied his junior high friends together for a fun get-together at the local trampoline and bounce center. I taught Isaiah that when he's invited to an event, he needs to approach me with his request to attend with the full story: who will be there, what time, where is it, how much will it cost, and how will you get to and from the event. He finally got all the information together on the first try when he asked if he could go with his friends. A dozen 7th graders would meet at 11am on Monday at the bounce center, pay $10/hr to play, and transportation would be provided by each kid's parent. Simple enough.
We arrived at the bounce center 15 minutes early (I am the sole early bird in Arizona and I thank my MN roots for that...Minnesotans like to arrive early to help the hostess set up, typically, and being late is looked at as rude and inconsiderate.) At 11:05, Jeremy and his mom Kim showed up. She and I chatted about the normal "mother of a preteen" issues as we waited for the other kids to show up. In the meantime, we discussed how long the kids would be allowed to play.
"I'm going to let Isaiah play for an hour and I think I'll stay and let Jackson play too." Although pleasant, Kim said, "Oh...well...I'm going to let Jeremy stay for the maximum - three hours. Isaiah's going to miss out on all the fun if he leaves early!" I kindly explained that I am all for letting my kids have fun, but I'm not going to cater my day off to my kids' play needs at a screaming $10 per hour play center.
Then two more moms arrived with their boys. "How long are you going to let your boys stay?" I asked one mom. "As long as this lasts!" she laughed as she held up a $20 bill. The other mom consulted with all of us before deciding how long her son would be allowed to stay. So it looked like everyone would stay 2-3 hours except for Isaiah, who was just excited to be hanging out with friends at all. Then Isaiah's buddy Tommy showed up with his dad, Joe. Joe is like me...practical. He and I decided that after an hour of playing, I would bring the kids home and Tommy and Isaiah would have a united front when they needed to leave "early."
While bouncing Jackson ran into his classmate, Emerson (whose parents will be friends 64 and 65.) At the one-hour mark, I went to gather the three boys and found the sweatiest, wettest kids in the world. I knew they had a blast and I knew they were ready to leave. They thanked me for bringing them and as we walked out, Jeremy ran up to us and asked me if I could bring him home. "But you still have two hours left!" I explained. "I'm bored and my mom's not coming for a while." I let him call Kim and she convinced him to stay, reminding him that she had paid $30 for him to play.
I laughed a little inside and walked out the door.
No comments:
Post a Comment