Words of a Child

What fun. Deep Thinker will be a second grader when the summer is over. He asked if he could have an allowance. I thought, sure. But let’s give him at least one or two chores. (He currently has no chores and I have been pondering when to introduce them. I suppose I’m behind on this…)

Anyway, his two chores are watering the lawn and making his bed. I love those chores. Because I don’t like doing them. But he LOVES doing them. He feels responsible and he likes the idea of “earning” money.

Because he’s so conscious of rules, I didn’t think too much about the need to repeat and enforce the lawn-watering rules. There’s just one rule: Don’t water over or beyond the 8-foot fence around our yard. We have neighbors on each side, plus another neighbor right beyond the fence.

But tonight as he was watering the lawn, an irate neighbor called me and said that Deep Thinker was not only watering her windows, but before she could close them, he managed to water her PRINTER which sits right inside the window. And he watered her BED which is beside the printer. I suppose her four cats really enjoyed that. I suppose I really enjoyed that phone call.

Of course, Deep Thinker was MORTIFIED when I told him about this. He was so upset he didn’t even ask about his allowance. He just wanted another chance to water our lawn. He he. We walked over so that he could explain that he didn’t realize he was watering things beyond the fence. I was so proud of him. He’s so shy, but made a nice brave apology. And I think that smoothed things over…I hope.

Hm. So that’s what a mother gets for providing the allowance he asked for…

Filed under: Damage Control, Lessons Learned, Uncategorized