Another "First"

Growing up can be summed up by a string of "Firsts" that begin with the first smile and follow to first words and first steps and first teeth and first day of school and on and on and on. I suspect that even as we grow old we will continue to measure life by "Firsts". First gray hair, first aches and pains, first time we forget something, first time we don't make it to the toilet, first time we need help feeding ourselves and on and on until the very end. At least one hopes for that long road instead of a tragic and sudden end. (Wow, that thought just took a radical turn from where it began, didn't it?) On that very philosophical note, how I do digress. (Must be the full moon!)

Erin has recently begun the new phase of life called "chores and allowance". In other words, I as her mother can now bribe her to help me pick up after her by giving her money once a week to spend as she pleases. And might I say it has been working splendidly so far. It started at the beginning of the summer with a dollar a week to keep her bed made and pick up all the toys from her rooms at least once a week. Then I started thinking, wait a minute - that's stuff she should have to do in a normal course of daily life and shouldn't amount to my having to pay her cold hard cash! So, we added dusting the living room. Of course she loved the whole idea of using the coveted feather duster "like a real life maid, Mommy!" and didn't complain a bit. That lasted a couple of months and now she thinks there's something called inflation that causes her to need $2 a week instead of our original $1. (Tell me, WHAT does a 6-year old need with $2 a week??!) She doesn't know the term inflation but it amounts to the same thing, right? So, we now have a chore jar with random chores that she is capable of doing and which SOMEONE has to do on a weekly basis to keep the house looking like civilized people actually live here and not a troop of gypsies. She pulls one out twice a week and that accounts for the increase of allowance. She's gotten a bit confused at times on how the whole thing works and wants the money before she does the chores. We have to discuss how I don't PRE-pay for services. She looks at me like I just don't understand how the Universe works and I shake my head and say "I'm the Mommy and that's the way it is - take it or leave it". Which luckily still works!

Last Friday the ice cream man made his slow crawl through our neighborhood and Erin got to buy an ice cream with her VERY OWN MONEY, MOM!! You would have thought she had just invented the cure for the cold or got to see Matchbox Twenty at the grocery store. (Or that the ice cream was made of gold instead of high fructose corn syrup!) This is her with the coveted "first ice cream bought with my own money". Notice Sasha knows that most of the ice cream will still end up on the cement and she is sticking to Erin like stink on... well, white on rice! Our baby is growing up one "first" after another and this is no exception!