Money, toys, and Neck Cookie Young

A few weeks ago Nora Lee and I were in Target. She loves going through the toy section and I often will set my phone alarm for 10 minutes and let her look at all of the toys. We rarely buy anything but she has fun gazing at it all. On this particular day she really wanted a toy - a princess doll. These dolls are the size of Barbie but are a Disney princess like Belle or Cinderella. She really wanted one. So I asked her if she would like me to come up with some ways that she could earn money. She really liked that idea.

We left the store and I started thinking of tasks she could do -

Making her bed - 10 cents
Bringing her dishes to the kitchen - 10 cents
Setting the table - 10 cents
Sorting laundry - 50 cents
Sweeping the porch - 25 cents
Washing the windows (her favorite) - 50 cents
Vacuuming her rug - 25 cents
Mopping - 25 cents/room

Ultimately these are tasks that she will need to do just because she is part of the family, but being three years old, there are a limited number of things she can do. Nora Lee was very excited about earning money and was like a little Cinderella that day.

She had been given a piggy bank and at that time had started collecting loose change from around the house and raided our change jar. Because of this, it only took her a few days to gather up the $10 required to buy the doll. I don't know if it was good or bad that she got a reward so quickly. I was worried at first that it would take her so long to save up the ten bucks that she would be discouraged. But since it happened so quickly would she think earning $10 was a piece of cake?
In any case, we headed to Target where she joyfully picked out and paid for a Snow White doll. Success!

Nora Lee loves counting and Spanish. She is aching to learn more Spanish (she has actually learned quite a bit from watching Dora the Explorer) and we are looking for ways to make that happen. She can count to ten in Spanish and can count to 100 in English with some assistance. She understands that once you know how to count to ten you can count to 100 if you learn 20, 30, 40, etc.

After watching Sleeping Beauty she became obsessed with the number 100 (because Sleeping Beauty falls asleep for 100 years until the prince wakes her). This obsession has now turned into 1000. Let me explain what I mean. She uses 1000 to mean how much of something. For example, "I love you 1000 much" or like this morning when I asked her if her hands were messy she responded, "Just a tiny bit, like 1000 tiny bit messy."

Nora Lee has an imaginary friend that is her dog. Her name is Neck. Yes, that's right, Neck. The greatest name of all time. Her full name is Neck Cookie Young and she goes just about everywhere with us. We'll be in the house and all of a sudden Nora will say, "Oh no! Neck is pooping all over the house! I'll clean it up."

My favorite recent quote by Nora Lee: : "Mama, you are so still and calm. I love that about you mama."