Oh, Dearest Mother, Sweetest Virgin of Altagracia, our Patroness. You are our Advocate and to you we recommend our needs. You are our Teacher and like disciples we come to learn from the example of your holy life. You are our Mother, and like children, we come to offer you all of the love of our hearts. Receive, dearest Mother, our offerings and listen attentively to our supplications. Amen.



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albeto
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Posted: Oct 17 2009 at 7:06pm | IP Logged Quote albeto

I have three children age 9 - 14. Currently, they have a very small allowance as we figured it would be their "mad money" they wouldn't have to account for.

I'm tossing around the idea of increasing their allowance for two reasons. One is to give them some practical experience budgeting. It's one thing to have money to spend on simple toys, another if you're expected to pay for your own Halloween costume or new jeans. The second reason is to correlate work with payment.

My oldest has Asperger's and giving up control is something that is very difficult for him. Doing school work because it's his responsibility feels like manipulation to him but since he's 14, I wonder if it's not time for him to correlate work with a weekly paycheck. He has a hard time respecting other people's property and paying for broken and lost things costs money.

I'd love to hear what works (and doesn't work) for you.

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LLMom
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Posted: Oct 18 2009 at 11:42pm | IP Logged Quote LLMom

We have always given our dc a very small allowance. But it is not a payment for work they do around the house. We make that very clear. They work because they live here and are a vital part of the family. We teach them to save a little, give a little, and spend a little. (We do this also with their gift money) Once they have a "real" job, we quit giving them allowance. Right now my 10 and 16 year old have jobs so they don't get an allowance. Then, we have them pay for things like movies, carnival rides, etc. that can be expensive for a large family. That is how it has worked best for us.

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melanie
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Posted: Oct 21 2009 at 5:15pm | IP Logged Quote melanie

My kids get an allowance once they are around 6 or so. They put 10% in the church basket and 10% in a savings jar that gets emptied into a savings account when it's full. I try really, really hard to leave them alone about how they spend the rest, as long as it's not on something we've decided is not allowed in the house for other reasons. I do think, though, that it's very reasonable to use allowance to replace things that you have been careless with. We do that all the time. Especially for the 9yo...he is rather thoughtless that way. He picked up a bracelet of my daughter's once and was bending it back and forth and broke it, and so he paid her for it. Also, he recently decided to use the entire shampoo bottle as bubble bath...this is the second bottle he has done this with,s o he is buying the next one.

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albeto
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Posted: Oct 22 2009 at 10:09am | IP Logged Quote albeto

melanie wrote:
I do think, though, that it's very reasonable to use allowance to replace things that you have been careless with. We do that all the time. Especially for the 9yo...he is rather thoughtless that way. He picked up a bracelet of my daughter's once and was bending it back and forth and broke it, and so he paid her for it. Also, he recently decided to use the entire shampoo bottle as bubble bath...this is the second bottle he has done this with,s o he is buying the next one.


Which prompts me to increase allowance. He doesn't have enough to pay now. Maybe it will help "click" that his hard work can lead to personal reward or spent on reparations from foolish impulsiveness.
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JodieLyn
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Posted: Oct 22 2009 at 11:30am | IP Logged Quote JodieLyn

I have a friend who looked at all the "extra" things that they tended to spend on the kids.. trying to think of an example but the only one coming to mind is..

When they'd go out to eat.. dinner and milk they didn't consider extra.. but sodas or dessert those would be extra.

And then their allowance was increased but the parents no longer paid for extras.. they didn't have to say "no you can't have a soda with dinner" rather instead it was, if you pay for it you can have it.

And I think she made up dummy checks so that her kids could write her a check for those things (and learn to balance a checkbook into the bargain) and not carry cash around so much.

If you gave him the money to buy his own shampoo as part of his allowance then he might think twice about wasting it.. you know about how long it should last so even not dumping a whole bottle, if he's wasting it will eventually catch up with him, because he'll have to buy it more often than he'll have money for, except for dipping into the fun things.

Make a list of all those things that the kids would not be buying for themselves and a realistic amount that you spend on it. So that if you buy shampoo every 6 weeks.. you can divide that money out over 6 weeks for their allowance. And the same with special soap or deoderant or treats at the store (you no longer buy them, they do) etc etc. Then you have an amount that you're already paying out to someone.. you're just giving them the money to manage for those things that they are concerned with and/or have control over.

And they get lovely choices like.. do I get my favorite deoderant or the one that's half the cost.

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