Because I want an iPhone like a fat kid wants cake

(Especially if it's store bought white cake with buttercream frosting, so sugary it makes you want to pass out. And you get a corner piece with lots of that frosting.)

(Mmm. Frosting.)

Anyway - over at The Parent Bloggers Network they're having a contest! With help from Capitol One! And the prize is an iPhone! And all I have to do is tell you how I'm teaching little AM about money.

Easy peasy, lemon squeezy, right? I mean, come on - just look at what I've already posted this week! It's destiny!

So here's the question: when do you start teaching kids about money?

My answer: as soon as you get the hospital bill.

Kidding! I'm kidding! But I do think that the earlier, the better.

I've already discussed how I have to choose my words around Anna Marie. She, like most kids, doesn't understand the concept of money very well. For instance, I can't tell you how many times she's asked why we haven't gone to Walt Disney World. And my answer is always the same - because we haven't saved enough money. And her answer is always the same: then why don't I go to work, and make some more?

Oh, if only it were that simple.

Just like it's difficult to teach kids that having a checkbook full of pieces of paper with your routing number on them doesn't guarantee sufficient funds to buy stuff, it's difficult to make them understand that just because you earned some money, doesn't mean you can spend it willy-nilly.

There are wee small roadblocks to that philosophy, and around these parts we call them food, shelter, and clothes.

We've already made her start saving for things she wants that are extra (like Webkinz or Build-A-Bear). And now, I'm going to follow Karen's suggestion that she save for that Nintendo DS she wants.

This morning, I had a talk with her about saving. Because when I wanted an iPod, I had to save for it. And when her dad wanted a Zune (and for the love of Pete I can't figure out why he did) he saved for it. So if she wants that video game, she's going to save for it.

Her birthday is in a couple of weeks, so she's going to ask for money and/or Target cards. In fact, I have a $5 Target card I got for buying a bunch of Kashi stuff this week, so I may give that to her for seed money.

During football season, the cheerleaders come around selling ribbons and tattoos. And if she stays on "green" enough during the week, she gets money for that. But now, she's got the option of using that money to save for her DS. And, she thought that was a great idea!

(Let's see, though, how she felt when the other kids were getting stuff this morning and she wasn't.)

Instead of telling her we're broke all the time, I try to couch it in terms of "priorities." Because I could take the rent money to buy an X-Box, but then we'd have a little trouble the next time it rained. Shelter is a priority!

And, I could take my tithe money each week and buy her something with it, but one of our priorities is honoring God with our finances.

It's hard to teach her about priorities when SpongeBob is sponsored by the Evil Toy Conglomerate and her friends are getting iPod Nanos and cell phones for Christmas in kindergarten. But I think that's the best way to teach kids about money - not scaring them into thinking that they won't know where their next meal is coming from if that isn't an issue, but letting them know what your family values and chooses to spend its money on.

(And it doesn't hurt to teach them about the possibility of winning those things we want either, does it?)

On having a literal-minded kid

Really, aren't they all that way?

Karen left a comment laughing about my using the term "out of my budget" when telling Anna Marie why we can't (or won't) spend money on something. I have a very good reason for choosing my words carefully - and apparently, Jason hasn't learned that lesson yet.

Did you guys ever hear the phrase "cash-free society?" Well, if you have small children, it just isn't true! Since she's started school, we have to keep cash on hand several days a week for lunches, or "snack store," or the ribbons the cheerleaders come around every Friday peddling to unsuspecting youngsters.

Add to that the need for offering on Sunday, and you see my point.

Problem is, we don't carry cash - and haven't since before we were married. We started using our debit cards in college, and haven't looked back. Want to know why we never go to the Waffle House here in town? Because they don't take cards!

So, this weekend (as you've already read) we were pretty busy. And on the way to church Sunday, Jason fished around and found a few cents to give Anna Marie for her Sunday School/children's church offering.

"That's all you've got?" she asked. (Before you start to think she's greedy, let me interject that it was about 50 cents total, which she would have to split between the two offerings. And you know how churches like to have offering contests!)

"That's all the money I have," Jason innocently responded.

As soon as he said it, I knew he'd messed up. I KNEW where her mind would go, and tried to issue a correction - it was all the cash he had.

It fell on deaf ears, though, because Anna Marie went into panic mode.

"But how will we eat Backyard Burgers on Thursday?"

Yep. She didn't worry about food that day, or the days between Sunday and Thursday, or even how we'd put gas in the car or pay the other bills.

She thought her weekly "date" with her dad was in jeopardy.

Kids eat free at our BYB on Tuesday and Thursday nights. And every Thursday, while I fast before weighing in at my WW meeting, Jason and Anna Marie go across the street for dinner. Folks think it's so cute - the two of them out like that. They don't know it's because she's eating free, and he doesn't want to have to cook!

(And, for the record, I have a Women's Ministry meeting tonight, where we'll be eating, so the two red heads will probably end up over there tonight too.)

We don't even have to spend gas money to get over there, because, as I've stated about a bazillion times before, it's literally in my back yard. Unless the weather is bad, they walk!

And I don't want Anna Marie to think we're destitute all the time. I'm just cheap, or the item in question is something that we just don't want to buy. So I tell her it isn't in our budget - which is completely true. Especially when it comes to the Nintendo DS she's been asking for, or the iPod Nano, or the cell phone.

Totally not in our budget.

So let that be a lesson to you, all those who deal with small children - think before you speak! You could have a very panicked child on your hands!