Math Man

Xander has been driving me crazy. He has been driving Jon crazy. He has also been driving all our adult friends crazy.
Xander is in an all-out math frenzy.
He just discovered money.
We’ve been working hard to teach him financial responsibility. Experts say age six is when the concept of money should be introduced with an allowance.
The concept of working to earn money needs to be understood.
Xander gets this. He knows he gets paid for a service.
Ever since we saw “Hotel For Dogs” his little entrepreneurial wheels have been churning in his mind.
He’s been dog sitting for my parents ever since.
When asked to dog sit, he says upfront what is included in the fee (i.e. twice daily feedings of dog food and water, walks, and playtime). He’s also included special “dog training” by sitting the dogs in front of “Go, Diego, Go” to show them how to rescue dinosaurs.
There was that little mishap in the fall where X and a friend decided to wander off. The cops were called in and they brought their dogs.
What Xander remembers of the situation is: Dogs can be trained to rescue people!
He wants to train dogs to rescue people!
He says he wants to “be a cop with a dog.”
Sounds good to me, but clearly, he knows he needs to make some cash too.
His master business plan: make money while caring and training dogs.
I’m so excited that his six your old mind works like this.
We have a business man on our hands.
X has been earning an allowance of $2 a week for taking care of our animals (Josie and Nika). If we doesn’t, his pay gets docked.
Whoa, what a motivator.
Now, that he has some money to his name, we’ve started a savings account, and he wants to count, count, and recount what he has, over and over and over again with everybody he thinks is capable of doing the math with him.
He has a money box that he wants to bring everywhere. He wants to know how to count by fives, then tens, then twenty-fives, hundreds, and two hundreds.
I sat him in front of some spiderman math workbooks on Tuesday when he wasn’t feeling the best during SCHOOL VACATION, he went through pages like it was the most enjoyable event of the week.
Forget about swimming, the playground, the four wheeler, momma, we’re doing math!
When we talk about math, his eyes light up, and he gets excited.
The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree on this one, both Jon and I, independently at young ages would hang out and count our money.
We would pour our our piggy banks and separate the pennies from dimes from quarters and count. Then we would add the numbers on paper.
I would take it to the bank.
To be real, playing with numbers is a hobby of ours. Jon is an engineer.
I make it a mission to figure out how to squeeze every single dime and rebate out of shopping. It’s a challenge, almost sport-like, to see how beautifully I can decorate a space for the cheapest price.
I think I do okay. Our patio is coming along nicely from solely flee market and “seconds” finds. You’ll never be able to tell.
It’s a green thing, and Xander doesn’t even know we’re trying to teach him how to save the world while living comfortably.