"Raising grateful kids in an entitled world"

Oh do I fall into so many traps with Daniel, his table full of Star Wars crap is proof that I fail to limit materialistic items in our home.
Holidays and birthdays are difficult for me as my hubby gets excited about toys as much as Daniel and I have to explain to him less is more. It's not easy and most times I give in, as I did with his Death Star gift. I ask God every night to guide me as a parent to give my kids just enough to make them appreciate what they have but not too much to make them, oh the dreaded word, SPOILED!

One way we have started to reign things in was with the help of my sister. She was pretty sick and tired of her gifts getting lost in the shuffle of 20 other gifts that her Godson would get, finding her $100 present in the closet 3 months later. I would highly recommend this. She started a college fund for both kids. For this XMas and D's bday she deposited $ into this account. The same type of account was started for Michael. Now, my mom and sister deposit money into this account as do we. We have met with a financial advisor who was quick to say "don't make it your goal to PAY for your kids' college in full, that's not going to happen with the cost of tuition predictions, focus on your own retirement and make their college funds accounts that will be used for books and cost of college living". May I add that I had student loans, which pushed me to finish college in 4 years. My goal was to finish paying them off ASAP. It made me appreciate my degree that much more and I didn't leave my mom dirt poor. They helped with the cost of books and contributed to my tuition as best as they could.

We have many conversations now with Daniel about being thankful, telling him many kids don't have what he has. When he turned 5 we gave him jobs, getting dressed by a certain time, helping me with his laundry (throwing the laundry in, pouring detergent and then transferring from washer to dryer), putting his pajamas on at a certain time of the night and cleaning up his toys at the end of the day.
This summer we will ensure he helps with some outdoor chores as well.
Here is a good blog post on the same topic:
http://wearethatfamily.com/2013/03/raising-grateful-kids-in-an-entitled-world/

Now to get control over our vacation...