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Community Corner

Column: It's My Money

When you don't agree with how your kids spend their own money.

It sounds like my son thinks he’s Mr. Money Bags at his lunch table. My middle daughter reported to me at school pick up yesterday:

“Mom, he was buying Snapples for everyone at his table!”

Their grammar school cafeteria sells a bottle of Snapple iced tea for $1.00 each. Apparently, my six-year-old somehow had enough money with him to treat himself and four of his closest friends to Snapples. And apparently, my eight-year-old daughter likes to keep an eye on him.

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I imagine how my son phrased his offer:

"Who needs a drink?”

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“No, no, guys, I got this round.”

“Drinks on me!”

This prelude of what’s to come is a little frightening.

I grilled my son on where he got the money to buy the Snapples.

“It was in my piggybank.”

“Okay, but how did it get in your piggybank?”

He’s unemployed with no steady income and hasn’t lost a tooth recently.

“Grandpa gave me five bucks at Christmas.”

Oh, right. My dad plays this Christmas game with all of the grandkids where they each pick a sealed envelope, have a chance to trade with each other and then open them up. One out of 10 wins $20, a few cousins go home with tens and the rest nab fives. My guy walked away with a five and apparently thought the most useful way to spend it was on Snapples.

I remind him that we can get a better deal than $1.00 per Snapple. “Do you know that I can buy a case of 24 Snapples at Costco for about $12? That means each one costs only fifty cents? Why are you wasting your money on the $1.00 Snapples?”

Blink, blink back at me. I guess the math was too much for his first grade brain. However, he was quick enough to reply - in a more sarcastic tone that I would prefer - “Wellllll … then why don’t you buy me the case of Snapple?”

Now it was my turn to blink, blink back at him.

“That is not the point. The point is that you have better things to do with your money, like save for college.”

“But it’s my money,” he said.

Let’s face it, when you are six the notion of saving for college is so incredibly abstract and distant that I may as well have been speaking Latin to him. And, he does have a savings account into which I already tortureously force him to deposit birthday checks. 

So, this five bucks was in actuality, his money. It wasn’t allowance he had to earn, it wasn’t change scrounged from the car.  It was his with no strings attached; his fair and square.

If he wants to waste his money throwing a little lunch party for his best buds, then so be it. I shouldn't try to stop him.

But the next time I go to Costco, I’m definitely picking up that case of Snapple.

About this column: Kathy Yevchak is a mother of three and the author of two children's books. She also works part-time in corporate writing and training.

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