Thursday, February 08, 2007

Learning it the Hard Way

I watch this little boy every Thrusday. The first Thrusday I watched him, I had to run an errand to Walmart, so he came with me and was pretty good. Except that he really wanted a transformer. At the time, I was tough and said, sorry Luke, you can't have one, b/c there is no way that I am going to buy you one. So today little Luke comes with a 5 dollar bill and immediately said to me, can we go to Walmart? There is this transformer I really want. The kid is 4. So like the good baby sitter that I am, I took him. Sims, Luke and I all went to Walmart, got a few groceries for me and then set out in search of the spider transformer.

We got to this kids isle and couldn't find that specific transformer. So I pointed to a row and said, ok Luke, these are the only ones that you can afford pick one out. At that point, I saw a friend of mine and we started chatting. Meanwhile, Luke picked a transformer and put it in the cart. After the chat was over and we went to the check out. I was dismayed to find that the transformer he had picked out was not 5 dollars, but in fact 20 dollars. But the checker had already scanned it, bagged it and gave it to Luke. I was soooo horrified b/c we are trying to pinch the old pennies and here I am in this situation. But I couldn't rip the transformer out of this poor boys hand, who didn't understand anything about money. So like the sap that I am, I just didn't do anything. I am such a dope. But I learned a very valuable lesson, never let a child put anything in your cart without knowing the price first! Unfortunately, I had to learn it the hard way!

2 comments:

Jer said...

Oh man, I feel for ya!! Whoever would have thought that parenting would present such tough situations?

Anonymous said...

People should read this.