It started with a haircut.
We told Ian that if he let Dad cut his hair we'd buy him a lego set. It made sense. Haircut $20.00 + $5.00 tip = $25
Okay, so the Lego set they started with was slightly more than $25, but the theory was the sets would get smaller and the haircuts easier. And they did. He now lets Dad cut his hair with no bribery involved.
Then it moved to naps and healthy food. One sticker for each occurrence. Set number of occurrences. Lego earned. Notice I said...EARNED! And then one day having endured a high fever or temporary alien abduction I blurted out I'll buy you the Crystal Sweeper IF you earn it by sleeping in your own bed for 10 nights and quietly resting in your room during naptime. So that is really 20 occurrences. The problem?
CHECK YOUR PRICES FIRST! Good gosh it is pricey! And now he's expecting it. And well, he did earn it. In fact, he earned it like 7 days ago but didn't realize it because we never actually made the sticker board. He'd just say every night as we went upstairs, "remember, I'm working on my crystal sweeper" and dutifully march into his own bedroom!
So I'll spend the money.
But now we've really created a problem! My four year old child has become a collector. A COLLECTOR! He just wants to acquire them! Does he play with them? Yes. Will he play with them more as he gets older? I can hope. Now he spends most of his time asking to watch Lego.com so he can see what else there is. And he asks, "someday can I have the..." And we answer, "yes, someday."
I draw the line at the Millennium Falcon!
7 comments:
Haha suckers
(shaking head) Katrina, Katrina. You should have told me you were drifting into the lair of the Lego marketing team. I would have warned you. There's no going back now. All we can do is let our boys share their creations online, and hope we contibuted to their development.
This is so funny! We have just decided to reward our, nearly, four year old for going into Sunday School nicely (now there is much crying and carrying on), we will have to tread carefully :)
omgosh, I can't believe you can actually spend that much money on one lego set!!! And I apologize for laughing at your predicament. :)
Kathie
Great story. Just ask dh how many millions of Lego pieces he has picked up out of the carpet. I would say we got our money's worth over the years!
We have probably had more Lego's sucked up our vaccum cleaners than we have left! Now our original Lego's from the 60' and 70's are doing double duty in the twenty-first century for our grandchildren. So, Katrina & Myra ... save them and your can reuse them one of these days.
I found a fantastic tractor that our then 10 year old son made in 1982 that he would not let me break down and put in the box with the pieces. It is still perfect ... I should use if for a photography subject or your class Katrina!
One more thing ... I cannot get over just how much Lego's cost these days! I checked out the two that you mentioned Katrina ... stay away from the Millennium Falcon!!! :)
Bwhaha! We also use the Lego approach to parenting but we have ALL spent so much time absorbing the Lego catalog that we know how much things cost! Tommy is STILL working on getting Crystal Sweeper. It might just take him years ;)
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