Holding on to Magical Moments

 

I've been having Christmas light envy.

 

You know - when you drive around town and see everyone's houses all decorated, lights twinkling across their rooftops, beautifully decorated trees peeking out of window panes when you haven't hung a single strand of lights.

 

 

Yeah, I was itching to get at least a strand of lights hung but I've been busy with work and Jason has been training for a little 5K that we're doing this weekend.

 

 

But we set out this weekend with my brother and sister in law to find tree #1 (you might remember that we get two trees each year).    As a side note - my brother-in-law is Jason's brother -- who has become another coupon cowboy.  My sister-in-law Shannon and I are the lucky ladies who have shelves and shelves of hair care products at our disposal.  (Sorry I didn't get a picture of Joe and Shannon and my niece Kendra but I swear they were all there with us!)

 

It's a family tradition for us to go out and cut down our trees every year and this year, Noah got to walk the fields right along with us.




 

 

 

He was fascinated by everything, including this pine branch his Uncle Joe plucked from a tree for him.

 

 

 

 

 

He quickly discovered that he liked the way it smelled.

 

 

 

 

 

 

After a while of searching, we found just the tree we were looking for:  tall but not too fat.  We have a tendency to get really bushy trees that take up our whole living room.  We tried to avoid that this year.  We kept thinking the tree we found might not be tall enough.  If you've ever cut a tree down, you know the feeling of thinking all of the trees look small once you're out in the woods.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

But based on how difficult it was for Jason and Joe to get the tree up to the car, we figured it must be bigger than we thought.

 

 

 

 

 

 

It was certainly tall enough. Jason couldn't even reach the top when he was standing on the ladder and we had to put the tree where the skylights are to give it extra room!

 

 



 

 

We made a big pot of chili (a tradition each year) and got to work decorating.  Noah needed a little help at first.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

But he quickly caught on, and joined his sister Imani, who is a pro at decorating trees now.

 

 

 

 

 

There's something magical about decorating the tree each year.  I wish I could hold the feeling in my heart all year long.

 

 

 

 

 

But the busyness of life goes on . . . Monday comes and I go to work, doing my very best to work my hardest and my perspective changes -- if only for a work day -- what's important shifts to job, bills, errands.

 

And only one night after the decorating started and that magical feeling begins to fade, I come home from work and see this.

 



 

 

And I'm reminded of the magic of the season all over again.

 

 



Teaching the Value of Hard Work

I hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving!  I enjoyed seeing my family and I am definitely enjoying a couple of days off from work!  It's been pretty intense over the last month, so I am enjoying time to read, knit, craft and just relax with my family!

 

A while back I mentioned that we have a new system of how to pay allowance to Imani so I wanted to take the time to share it with all of you.  It has been working out well so far and we've been doing it for a few months.

 

As I mentioned before, we used to just give Imani $20 every month.  She was only expected to help out as needed, make her bed and sweep the stairs.  We came to realize that this method wasn't really working out so well.  Half of the time, her bed wasn't made and the stairs were rarely swept.  Nonetheless, she had her little hand extended every 1st day of the month in expectation of her $20. 

 

So we decided we would start to pay her weekly, rather than monthly, and we would give her a list of a bunch of things around the house that need to be done regularly. 

 

We keep a big bottle of marbles and each marble is worth 25 cents.  Each time Imani does something off of the list, she gets a marble (or two, depending on the chore).

 

Sometimes, Imani thinks of other things she would like to do (like vacuum my car or brush Maggie or clean Noah's room) and she will ask if she can get a marble for it.

She keeps all of her marbles for the week in a different jar.  On Sunday, we count up how much we owe her and we pay her for her work.  She is expected to save 10 percent and donate 10 percent (anywhere she'd like - sometimes it goes to Church, sometimes to the library, sometimes to the SPCA . . . wherever she feels like giving).

 

 

 

 

 

When we first rolled this out, Imani was on a mission:  She cleaned the whole house and practically filled her jar with marbles.  Jason and I got nervous that we'd be handing over half of our bank account to Imani.

 

But over time her enthusiasm has leveled out. During the week, when homework, basketball and practicing her violin take up a lot of her time, she doesn't do as much to earn marbles.

 

We've noticed that on the weekends, she will often pick up a broom instead of the iPad.  It's been great.

 

Another cool thing about this is that if we ask Imani to help us with something and she doesn't, or if she misbehaves, talks back etc, we will tell her she needs to take a marble out of her jar.  Yes, we "charge" her in a way. 

 

We expect that she will still contribute in a meaningful and positive way in the house: that she doesn't ONLY help for marbles -- so if we ask for help or tell her to do something (like pick up her room), she is expected to do it without complaint and without earning a marble.

 

There is one chore that is expected every day and she doesn't get a marble for it.  She must make her bed.  If she doesn't make her bed, she has to take a marble out of her jar. The exception is if OUR bed isn't made . . . then we can't charge her.  She loves to see if our bed is made so it sort of keeps us all accountable.

 

There have also been times when I see her do something incredibly generous or kind and I want her to know I recognized it -- so I'll tell her later, "I really liked how you were generous with your friend when she came over today.  I'd like to give you an extra marble in your jar."

 

She loves when that happens.

 

Don't get me wrong; on more than one occasion Imani has grumbled, "Can we go back to the old way for allowance?! I hate this way."  She hates it because she actually has to DO something to get the money. 

 

But she loves getting paid weekly. 

 

She loves seeing the marbles accumulate in the jar,

 

and she loves being in control of being paid more.

 

She's been really motivated because she is saving up for a Macbook.  She also told me last week that this year, she wants to buy me and Jason a present for Christmas with her own money, so she's been setting some of her money aside for that. 

 

I'm really proud of her.

 

Some of the things she can do to make money are:

 

Sweep the stairs - 25cents

Empty the bathroom garbage cans - 25 cents

Vacuum the house - 50 cents

Pick up Maggie's dog doo doo in the yard - 50 cents (we know we're making out on this one . . . but she must know it too because she never does it!!)

Dust - 25cents

Put in a load of laundry - 25 cents

Load the dishwasher - 25 cents

 

 That's just a snapshot of a few of the chores.  She can always ask if there is something else she'd like to do.

 

We believe it's important for Imani to have money of her own so she understands how to save, how to make smart purchases and the value of hard work.

 

So far, this system has worked well for us!

 

I'd love to hear how all of you pay allowance (or why you don't pay allowance) to your children.

 

Have a great weekend.  "See" you Monday (I promise :-)

 

 

 

 

 

Home-Related Thanks

Happy Thanksgiving!!  

 

First off, thank you to all of my dedicated readers who continue to read my home endeavors, despite the fact that I am inconsistent. 

 

I appreciate each and every one of you.

 

I hope you all have a warm, relaxing holiday filled with delicious food and loving family and friends.

 

I made a little video for you!

 

Enjoy!!

 

 

 

Charting Chores

I think my kid is spoiled. Not spoiled in the sense that she's ungrateful or rude, but spoiled because I haven't given her any real responsibilities on a regular basis.

I mean she's been getting $20 allowance every month just 'because.' She's supposed to sweep the stairs . . . You know- the stairs I so geniusly had Jason paint black a few years ago?  You can read about it here.

On a side note, do NOT paint your stairs black if
 A.) You like to hide dust

 B.) You have forced-air heat 

C.) You have children

 D.) You have pets

 E.) You want to stay sane.

If you ignore these rules and go ahead and paint your stairs black, do not think your 11-year old will sweep them.

Even if you're paying her $20 per month to do so.

So it was Imani's job to sweep the stairs every day and she'd get $20 in return every month. I will say that she is expected to give 10% to a charity of her choice every month and she has to deposit 10% in her bank account.

The problem was, even though Imani rarely did her expected task, she had her beautiful little brown hand stretched out to me each month for the cash.

Somewhere along the way . . . (probably when Imani was in diapers and I was a young, single mom reading every child-rearing book possible to assure myself that I wouldn't mess up my child) . . . I read some financial advisor's advice to NEVER link allowance to chores.

Clearly I didn't listen.  In fact, not only did I link sweeping the stairs with allowance, but I was paying even when the job wasn't done consistently.

So Jason and I decided something had to change.  As much as we love that sweet little Imani with those big brown peepers, every month we were teaching her that she didn't have to work for money.

So we're revamping allowance . . . I'll post more about that later. 

And we've decided that there are certain chores that are non-negotiable. They need to get done every day by all of us (without pay).

There are mainly three things that we decided to split up:  Combing Maggie (and brushing her teeth), Setting the table (with drinks), and cleaning up the table (which includes putting everything away and loading the dish washer).

As you know, I love Pinterest.  I found the cutest idea on there to rotate these chores so that no one gets stuck doing the same chore each night.

I bought printable magnetic sheets that look like this
 

 

 

 

I printed a picture of each of us on the magnetic sheets and cut them out so they looked like this.

 

 

 

 

 

Then, I made a chart listing each of the three chores.  I put our pictures under each of the three jobs and they just get moved over to the next column when you finish your chore.

 

 

We've been doing this for about two weeks and so far, it's working out great!

How is Ms. Imani making money, you wonder?  Stay tuned . . . I've got all the details for you (and she loves it, and so do we!)

Thanks for stopping by!

 

InstAddiction

Lately, I've been liking Instagram much more than Facebook. Have you joined yet? It's so much fun to see everyone's photos. Some people use Instagram as a way to preserve memories and share photos of their families while others use it to capture artistic shots of everyday objects.

 

I enjoy it so much, and it doesn't take up as much time as Facebook.

 

Last month, I attempted to participate in FatMumSlim's photo a day challenge.  Have you heard of it?

 

There is a topic each day and you take a picture to go along with the theme and use the hashtag #fmsphotoaday.

 

It's pretty cool to look back and see the month in review.  Although I missed a few days, I wanted to share my month's photos with you.  I'm joining in again this month if you'd like to join too!

 

If you follow me on Instagram, sometimes I add a little explanation. If you'd like to read any of them, you can click on the pictures at the bottom right of my blog and it will take you directly to my Instagram page. There are a lot of other great photos there too that don't go along with FatMumSlim's challenge -- just random shots of my life.

 

September 1 was "You, Now" and I missed that day.

 

September 2 was: "Father"

 

I  joined on September 3, and the topic was "Distance." I didn't know how to add text to my photos at this point in the game:

 

 

 

 

 

September 4 - "In My Mailbox."  I missed this day too!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

September 24: "3 Things" - I missed this day.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

If you'd like to join in this month, here are the October topics. It's not too late! Grab that smart phone and start shooting! You can share on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter or all three; just use #fmsphotoaday as your hashtag!

 

Have fun!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Our latest collection

 

Do you remember a couple of years ago when Jason was obsessed with old, rusty cans?

 

He got the nickname "The Can Man" for a while.

 

You can read about his can collecting adventures here.

 

Thankfully, that collection has halted.  The cans are still placed strategically around the house and I'd still like to get rid of them.

 

But Jason found a new object to collect.

 

We were walking around an antique store called "Found" here in Ithaca about a month ago and this little guy caught Jason's eye through the glass showcase.

 

 

 

 

I had a gift certificate for my birthday from my mother-in-law and I kept wandering around the store looking at vintage jewelry to buy but Jason had his eye on that fish.

 

I finally decided on a cake plate . . . it just happened that the cost of the cake plate wouldn't use up all of the gift certificate, so I decided I'd get the fish bottle opener for Jason.

 

Jason loves the bottle opener, especially since our old bottle opener is a little junky thing that probably came from the dollar store.

 

Right before Jason's birthday, I went on Etsy to see if I could find some more bottle openers, since J mentioned that it would be cool to have a collection.  I couldn't believe the selection!

 

I remembered reading in Martha Stewart or somewhere that usually collectors pick a common theme for their collection.

 

So antique plate collectors will often pick plates with only gold edging, or only blue plates, or only plates from a certain time period . . . you get the idea.

 

(For the can man, it was any can with lots of rust.)

 

So I had some choices.

 

I could buy only fish bottle openers.

 

Or only animal bottle openers.

 

In the end, I decided to go with bronze or gold bottle openers.

 

 

I found this darling little dog bottle opener.

 

 

 

 

And this horse bottle opener.

 

 

 

 

 

So now we have the beginning of a collection (the fish remains Jason's favorite).  Aren't they cute?!

 

 

 

 

 

 

And I'm no longer embarrassed when someone needs a bottle opener at my house.  Now we just need to figure out how to display them!