It all started many years ago when I was a little girl of about 6 or 7.
We used to live in Oregon, and we were absolutely experts in the art of growing dandelions!
Now, I personally have always liked dandelions, at least when they are a bright sunshine yellow and make the world look happy and Springtimy...
But my mom hated them and one day offered me a penny for every dandelion I picked!
Now lets fast forward to today, and to my front yard which, while not plagued by dandelions at this time of year, has suddenly become a garden of pine cones! They are everywhere and I hate them!
Soooooo...
I am pleased to report that inflation has not affected the pine cone picking up industry at all, Noah was thrilled at the prospect of a penny per pine cone picked...say that 5 times fast!
And aside from the benefit of a cleaner yard, I also have the opportunity to help Noah learn about the value of money!
I was so excited that I told him once his piggy bank was full to the top, he could buy himself a present at the store! (this will be ironically significant in a moment)...
Since I don't have a million pennies handy I must resort to paying him in larger coins...
First lesson, more coins does not necessarily mean more money!!!
Noah thinks that's pretty funny and opts for the pile of 20 nickels over the 10 dimes or the measly 4 quarters!
I tried several creative ways of showing him that the different coins have different values and so on and so forth until Noah finally stopped me by saying "I KNOW! But the nickels will fill up my piggy bank the fastest and then I can go to the store and by myself a present!"
Sheesh!
Well, lets not lose sight of the fact that I have my very own personal pine cone picker-upper!
What a fun idea and great lesson! I'll have to remember this one once I have my own kiddos!
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