Snack bar lessons

Last week the boys and I joined my parents for a trip to the beach.  Wonderful.  Maybe I'll write about it another day, but today I'm focusing on an interesting moment from this week.

We live in a sporty area.  My husband and I don't dislike sports, but neither of us played in high school so it's just not part of us.  Aaron chose band and other things instead of sports while I tried out for sports and just wasn't good enough to make it.  I'm good with that--I'm short and not very fast.  I also fouled a lot when I played basketball.  Being not very athletic while still competitive just makes for a bad combination.  So, I found my niche at church as well as being on the competitive acting team, in the musicals and choir.  Life was rich and full while just cheering the sports teams on from the side lines.

Enter motherhood.  So far, I don't think we have an all-star quarterback on our hands.  One of them really isn't very interested in sports.  The other I could see liking individual sports like cross country, golf or tennis.  Doesn't have the build for football.  The other little guy, we'll just see.

So this week they're all giving sports camps a try.  The one most interested in sports is doing basketball camp.  It's 3 hours long and a good taste of what the sport is--drills, fundamentals and games.  He's having fun.  The other 2 boys are doing tennis camp which is much shorter in duration and it's their first experience with the sport.  They watch me play against the garage door and sometimes try to join me, but this camp is specifically designed to introduce them to the game.  Super fun.

At basketball camp, parents can send money with kids for the concession stand.  Aaron and I discussed it--$8 for 4 days sounded very generous when I would have chosen to send a water bottle and keep that $8 for drinks at Sonic one afternoon instead.  We told #2 to buy only 1 drink and 1 snack a day.  Today was the end of Day 2 and from the basketball court during a game, he yells to me in the stands, "Mom!  I need more money!"  Hmmm.

He spent $8 in 2 days.  I'm just glad they didn't let him buy on credit.  There were 2 snack breaks a day in which he felt he had to buy a snack (candy bar) and drink (Sprite or Gatorade) at each, even though he hadn't drunk the drink from before.

Tennis camp offered no such opportunities for spending money and somehow the fact that I provided snacks was completely forgotten when #1&3 saw #2's haul.  Tears.  Yelling.  Yes, even fists in the minivan.  I pulled #3 off #2 and got him settled enough so that I could get him seatbelted in.  We went home.  I cooled off.  At lunch I told them that we would be heading to Target where I would get Gatorade for the rest of the days of camp and #1&3 could choose a candy bar.  Not #2--he had already had his.  I would also buy a snack for all 3 of them to have during their camps since #2 had run out of money.  This made them all happy.

Geez.  I didn't realize I would be teaching an economics lesson about scarcity when I woke up this morning.  After lunch, I had a quick chat with #2 about money.  I told him that he had spent his $8 and he wouldn't have more for the 2 remaining days of camp.  He would take his snack and Gatorade but would not be purchasing more.  I braced myself for tears that didn't come.  He felt badly that he hadn't obeyed what I had told him.  I assured him that I still love him and this is a good opportunity to learn about discipline. 

Discipline is hard.  For me, too.