Stress Free Christmas Shopping

Posted December 10, 2015

Christmas is just around the corner. If this time of year isn’t already busy enough for you, now you need to start thinking about what you are going to give your children this year. My goal is to make this Christmas a little easier on you, and hopefully on your pocketbook too, while at the same time providing financial lessons that you can teach your children and they won’t even know it!

Giving

If I have said it once, I have said it a million times, people who give are usually the most satisfied people. Teaching your children that it is better to give than to receive may be difficult, but if you are successful you will instill discipline and help your children become aware of others’ misfortunes that can help them stay focused on what is truly important. An idea that may help your child learn this lesson is by making a donation in your child’s name to a charity of their own choosing.

Reading

As a parent myself, I understand the temptation to take the path of least resistance and allow our children to spend too much time playing video games or watching YouTube videos. This may prove to be a challenging lesson and some of your children may not immediately see this as a good thing, but a good old fashioned book is a great way to ease a little moderation into their technological lives. If you need help picking out a book, go to your local library and spend a few minutes talking to the librarian about your child to get some great recommendations. Keep in mind that studies show that reading can greatly improve vocabulary, communication skills, creativity, focus and memory. All this can help your child do better in school, and if you’re lucky can lead to tuition assistance and better performance in college, with the end result being better potential future job opportunities for them.

Wanting

There is nothing wrong with giving your child something they want, as long you don’t get them everything they want! I understand that you do not want to disappoint your children but one of the most valuable lessons you can teach them is that they will never have everything they want. Teaching your children from a young age that money does not buy long term happiness can help them learn not to depend on things to make them happy. Things can’t love you back, no matter how much you may want them.

Needing

I can only think of a few things that we really need: food, shelter, transportation and clothing. The truth is that many grown-ups have a difficult time distinguishing between ‘wants’ and ‘needs’, and for children the difference is usually nonexistent. The earlier you can teach this lesson to your children the better off both of you will be financially. To teach this lesson to your child, the first thing you need to do is pick one of the four categories of needs and decide on a gift that falls within that category. For instance, you might select transportation, wanting to give your child a bike for Christmas so that they no longer have to walk to school. Once you have the gift in mind, decide how much you want to spend on that gift. You will give your child a gift card or cash in this amount and your child will be responsible for purchasing the gift themselves after Christmas. They must follow three simple rules: 1) they must use the funds to purchase the gift you selected, 2) they cannot go over budget and 3) they can keep half of any savings to spend as they wish but must add the rest to their charitable gift. The lesson here is that it is very easy to spend other people’s money, but when you have to spend your own, hopefully you will make wiser choices. Most kids do not grasp the concept of money management and it is better that they learn this at an early age when the consequences of unwise decisions are not as painful.

At the end of the day what matters most is the time you spend with your family, now how much money you spend on them! I pray that each and every one of you has a Merry Christmas and a Joyous and Healthy New Year!

article courtesy of http://thelifeofasinglemom.com/stress…

posted by Steve Repak
on December, 11
Source: Good Reads