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I found an interesting site for teaching children about money.  Have you seen it before?  It’s for kids who are from around my munchkin’s age to a few years older. 

Munchkin is not very good with money.  She seems to have an endless flow from the grandparents and the great-grandparents.  I tried to do an allowance to help teach her but I don’t think it’s made much of a difference.  Probably because when the allowance is gone, grandma or great-granddad or uncle W will give her more.  I have no idea how to stop the influx of money either.  They’re not large amounts to an adult but to a 7-year-old, they must seem huge. 

She has a savings account but I think teaching children about money is a bit more than just having a savings account.  It’s so important for them to learn to separate their needs and wants.  Munchkin isn’t good at that.  Perhaps it’s a symptom of only child syndrome?  But it’s not okay and I’m not really sure how to teach her better habits. 

So anyway, the website:  Kids Count: Teaching Children About Money
It’s mostly a financial literacy curriculum for schools and seems to be based out of Indiana but they have this game about separating needs from wants that I’m thinking about ordering, it can’t hurt.  And there’s a list of links under the parents tab that might be useful. 

I haven’t figured out how to control the grandparents or the aunts and uncles who seem to be Munchkin’s personal ATM machines but the site pointed me towards some things that might help me teach her good money habits despite their interference.  If we were home schooling, I’d try to get my hands on the curriculum too. 

sleepless in PA...
and the direct link here to see it larger

So I come out of work, rushing and cutting it close, trip over the cord of the vendor who was packing up their "singing in the shower" contest, and find out that my car won't start.  Wouldn't even attempt to start and the radio didn't come on.  I kicked at it and threw a minor hissy fit.  Then I dug out my AAA card.  Expired.  Did I renew it?  No.  Crap.  Jog back across the parking lot, dodge the shampoo people, and get a coworker to come out and give me a jump.  Car still won't start.  I kicked it...and it didn't help at all...so I called the neighbor-lady and let her know to expect my daughter because I was having trouble and going to be late.  Then I called my daughter and left a voicemail reviewing our "If an adult isn't there" plan. (I feel every school aged child, even one with a parent who is "always" home should have this emergency "if an adult isn't home" plan.)

My car was still attached to the coworker's truck and he said to give it just one more try.  And it started!  Yea!!!   So off I go home.  Except, now, I'm late and the traffic is bad.  Really bad.  Second gear on the highway with my left calf aching from constant clutch pressure bad.  My oil light came on...and my temperature gauge started to climb.  Crap!  But I was stuck because there wasn't anywhere to go.  I turned the heat on full blast and opened my window (to let the heat out) but still my temperature needle crept up.

But I made it home.  Munchkin did exactly what she was supposed to.  She and the fluffball were fine.  When I turned the car off, it started right back up.  Good.  Just a fluke then.  I may replace the battery anyway though.  

The weather is nice and I'm feeling pretty good and then I check SMO and there's someone there who just rubs em the wrong way and I want to fight.  But it's silly sh*t and it's online.  I don't want to fight with her, I just stressed enough that I want to fight with someone.  I think I should take a long walk in the nice weather to clear my head. 

I read this earlier today and this just now.  And as sometimes happens, it made me think and so I wrote and feel compelled to share.

 

I hope for my daughter: 

That the information she gets about sex is accurate and with minimal bias.

That she understands that her body belongs to herself and no one else. 

That she has sex when she feels ready, whether that’s “early” or “late.” 

That she never feels forced or coerced.  

That she has safe and easy access to both birth control and condoms. 

That she feels comfortable talking to me. 

That if she feels she can’t talk to me, she can find someone else to listen.

 

Of course, my daughter is seven and for her, these decisions and discussions are far in the future.  But the future comes faster than we expect. 

Pharmacists are clearly idiots.  If they weren’t, we wouldn’t have 33 pages of stores that can’t get their outdate and recall items sent back on time.  (And that’s down from 45 pages last week…)  Most of them apologize when I call, promise to call FedEx immediately.  They explain the delay and fall over themselves to be helpful.  It’s a power trip but I’m pleasant and helpful in return. I solve problems, answer questions if they’re having trouble, and offer my direct dial phone number if they need more help.  One pharmacist who needed a lot of help asked me today if I was also a marriage counselor (he was joking, I think).  

But every now and then, there’s one who makes me want to scream.  I can’t scream of course.  I can only remain pleasant and helpful; just because they’re rude doesn’t mean I can be.  They vent their stress at me, claim to be too busy to send the transfer back to our processor.  How would I know, right?  I’m just at corporate and not in the stores.  But seriously, how long does it take to call FedEx?  And I force myself to smile so there’s a smile in my voice.  Thank them for their time. 

Then, I call their district manager and explain that one of his stores has an issue.  I feel like a kid tattling to mom.  I can’t really do anything (sometimes, I think they know it) but he can.  The boxes will be sent back within a few days and next time I have to call that store (if there is a next time), they’ll be polite and helpful. 

Today, the district manager I called made me smile.  We had a recent rearrangement of authority and this is one of the stores that is new to him.  He said that if they were one of his old stores, they’d know better.  He made dire threats and then assured me that he meant them in the nicest way possible.  He’s one of the district managers that almost never has a store on my list, rarely needs to be called.  He was cheerful with me, annoyed at the store.  And I definitely like him a lot.  Very helpful.  He’ll get the problem store fixed.

Arcadia drew me into this thread.  What are we going to do with her?

Her Questions:
Does the name you don’t like affect how you feel about the child and the child’s parents?

I hate to admit it but yes, there is an effect.  Names are important.  Google and you can find dozens of articles about how a child’s name influences how they’re perceived by teachers and employers and peers.  It matters.  I try not to let that show to her or them.  But painful honesty in the blog at least, right?
 
Would you be annoyed if your IPs chose one of your other children’s names as the name of their baby to be?  Would that be confusing for you?  Upsetting?

I’d probably be a little annoyed or a little upset but I’d eventually get over it.  It wouldn’t be confusing though.  Many people have the same names.  There just aren’t enough names.  I work with someone who has my daughter’s middle name as her first name.  My daughter has 2 “Cassidy” kids in her class at school.  It happens.
The children with different names on their original birth certificate and the amended one, do you think they’ll be confused some day?

I hope not.  I think you were so confused and upset because you never knew.  They’ll know.  Their parents aren’t hiding things.  I know Morrigan has her original birth certificate in her baby scrap book for her (and everyone else) to see.
The child that you didn’t name at all, do you think that some day she’ll be upset because you didn’t care enough to name her and let her just be Baby Girl?    

I don’t know, maybe.  It’s not really that I “didn’t care enough to name her.”  The agency discouraged it.  And the hospital didn’t even offer me the paperwork.  I didn’t know I could name her.  And her parents had already picked a name.  I instantly disliked it…but I didn’t’ want to tell them.  What if they had decided they didn’t want her if I didn’t like their name?

This morning, the words, “mandatory meeting of all supply chain associates” were enough to throw the whole department into a panic.  It was sitting in our email inbox when we arrived. 

If they’re closing distribution centers, what’s next?  Is my safe cushy corporate job in danger?  Panic and confusion.  We’re consistently in the top 10 businesses most likely to go bankrupt in 2009.   On some lists, we’re top 3. 

Deep breath.  If we go bankrupt, with one type of bankruptcy (reorganization) my job will still b important.  Even if they liquidate everything, my job should be one of the last to go, right?  But how long will that take?
 
The DC closing was announced now and will be closed completely by the end of September.  That’s a lot of warning.  More than the amount required by law.  Things aren’t desperate or they’d be closing sooner, right?  I’m okay.  We have excess DC’s because we got all of the centers from the other chain that we swallowed last year.  It’s not a big deal.  We’re okay.  I hope…

It's been a rough weekend all around...and this hits me harder than my grandmother being in the hospital Saturday.  My grandmother is okay.  Discharged with instructions to monitor her blood sugar more carefully.  

But Dee died tonight.  Life will never be the same again.  Already, less than an hour later, I've had one person tell me she was "just a rabbit."  She was not "just" anything.  She was part of my life for over 5 years.  

She slept with me at night, sat beside me on the couch while I watched TV, greeted me when I came home from work.  

She twined between my ankles like a cat, trying to trip me in her silly bunny dance while I paced with contractions my last few pregnancies.  

She lay on my lap while I played endless rounds of Viva Pinata on insomnia nights.

She bit me countless times when I reached into her cage for the food bowl to feed her.  Left bruises too...

She destroyed cages, litterboxes, carpets, curtains, pillows, and my clothes - sometimes while I was wearing them.  

She burrowed under the covers to cuddle around my feet.  

She stood up in her cage, stretching to touch my nose with hers.

And now she'll never do those things again.  How can life go on?  Why did she have to die so soon?  We knew it was approaching but I wasn't ready.  The vet said a few weeks ago that she was just old.  House Rabbits can have a life span of 10-15 years but they can't all live so long, in fact, most don't.  

Goodbye my wonderful destructive demonic bunny...
We love you Dee...

The Good
Yesterday, Munchkin had her first T-ball practice.  I took the dog along.  Munchkin has a good throwing arm but a lack of attention.  I spent the whole practice worrying that she would get hit in the head with a ball she didn’t see was coming because she was picking at the grass.  Casper was my good boy and allowed the whole team to surround and pet him.  I stopped things when he started to look a little stressed but he wouldn’t have been able to deal with it for even a little while 6 months ago …yea Casper! 

 

In our Manners class, there is:

-A female black lab who is three years old and pretty well behaved.

-A male standard labradoodle – 9 months old - very bouncy and friendly

-A male German Shepherd mix – mostly friendly but not very controlled.  He’s a rescue.

-A female Maltese – she is also a rescue.  For her first year she was a puppy mill dog; she lived in a tiny cage and had a litter before she was a year old.  Now, she’s just really timid.

-A Jack Russell Mix puppy – 6 months old, very bouncy, barks the whole class. 

-And Casper who is my darling puppy love but is really a dunce on leash behaviors.  He sits, lays down, begs, dances, crawls, and is slowly understanding “roll over” but he thinks he has to be at the end of any leash he’s walking on whether it’s 6 feet or 25 feet.   

 

Class is a little crazy with that many dogs but it’s good for Casper.  He needs practice paying attention to me. 

 

Today, I went to pick up my rats.  They are pure cuteness.  They’re just weaned so they’re still pretty small and being female, probably won’t get too huge.  I love their teeny tiny little hands and the way they hold food while they nibble.  They’re from a breeder who handles all of the little ratlings at least twice per day.  The parents were both super friendly and the little darlings swarmed out of their cage and up my arm as soon as the cage door was opened.  I’m in love. 

 

They haven’t yet been introduced to the dog or the rabbits yet.  I want to give them time to settle in and feel safe before I add new scary things. 

 

Tomorrow I have game.  After that session, I should (if I’m lucky) have enough experience to learn the second level of Protean.  Once my character learns that, she’ll be able to grow claws.  That’s an important thing because being a woman she’s not expected to carry a sword.  She can carry concealed knives or daggers but they don’t do as much damage.  The only weapon she has that will deal aggravated damage (harder for other supernaturals to heal) is her teeth and it’s hard to bite someone in the middle of a fight.  Claws will be better. 

The Bad

I was on my way home from picking up the rats when my sister called me.  They had to call an ambulance for my grandmother.  I'm guessing from the description that it was a stroke...but I'm not a doctor and the hospital just says that they have to do more tests.  I'm waiting by the phone for updates.  I thought about going down to the hospital but I don't think I could be much help.  I'd probably just be in the way.  Mom is with Nana and I've done my shae of sitting in teh hospital with mom.  If they need me there, they can call me.