Trip Prep

Our summer vacation this year was a trip to Utah. It was our first time going back in a little over a year, and were excited to see family. This trip took a lot of prep work on my end, as we decided to d.r.i.v.e. with the kids and Kermit, 20 hours each way (splitting up into 2 10's) for a variety of reasons:

1- We wanted to take Kermit
2- I needed my brake rotors and pads replaced. Mike's dad has ALL of the tools to do this at home, and we knew we'd save a huge chunk of change if the two of them could crank it out one night.
3- Did a cost comparison and not only would we save on #2, realized we'd save more than a bundle if we didn't board the dog and didn't fly.
4- The reflective-looking-for-teaching-opportunities-parent in me thought it'd be a good chance for the kids to realize that things don't just immediately appear. What better way to instill the lesson of patience than to buckle them in their car seats for two days. Of course, the deal-with-the-reality-parent in me really wondered how this would actually turn out.
5- We're a bit crazy.

So funny to hear people's reactions when I'd mention that we were planning to drive to Utah. I'd get strong opinions that it wasn't possible to expect a 5 year old and 2 year old to handle life in the car for 2 entire days (4 if you add in the drive back). Or, I'd get the complete opposite from other people who do the same thing for the same reasons, and actually find it pretty doable (okay, most of those people are in our ward. And, they were all pretty much making the same drive. to Utah. Oddly, either the same time frame or overlapping the same time we were going.)

This was our first time doing the long car trip thing with the kids. Put together all kinds of games, books, snacks, what to pack, etc. I made too many lists, thought of way too many scenarios, and overall probably just spent too much time on the prep work. Probably because I was expecting the worst, and was, for the most part, dreading the unknown. Oh, and maybe I dreaded it because of the constant pit of nausea I'd knew I'd have the whole drive.

But, in the course of the prep work, I decided to create a teaching opportunity for Max. He's been talking about how he wants a transformer for AGES. And, we're pretty big sticklers on the nothing new unless it's your birthday or Christmas kind of thing, so I'd just been telling him he'd have to put it on his Christmas list for ages.

But then I thought this would be a great opportunity for him to earn his own toy. Wanting to avoid allowance, and scheduled "give me money because I did what I always do" entitlement attitude, I found this great idea on another blog to have him earn his money one extra chore at a time. Combined it with another great idea I heard from another mom, and voila he was on his way to earning himself a new toy for the drive to Utah.

So, just like you'd have someone earn extra credit in school, or give salespeople opportunities to add onto their base salary via commission, Max had the chance to earn his way to the transformer. All of his regular chores would not count towards anything. Those are things to do because things just need to get done. But, for every "extra" job he'd earn one box. One box = 10 cents. Maximum number of boxes to earn would give him a full $20 to spend, just about what he'd need for the transformer he'd had his eye on.

He'd have a little over a month, and I told him that when the month was up, he could take whatever he earned and head to the store with it. If he worked hard, we'd head to the store with transformers. If he didn't work hard, we'd go to the dollar store.

Talk about motivation for this kid. He worked his tail off, and was so happy to earn this. On his own. Fulfilling for me to have the "see how much work it takes to get something" talk, and for him to actually understand what I was saying.
Alexis even caught the action and earned herself a beautiful bracelet.