Spending Money

London and I went to the dollar store yesterday and I encouraged London to bring some money so she could buy herself something. She has been so good with her allowance and has put money aside in savings, some into her piggy bank for spending, and 10% toward tithing. She gets $2.50 every other week and it divides into $0.25 for tithing, $1.00 for savings, and then she keeps the $1.25. We are hoping that she will learn how to save, budget, and pay tithing earlier in life instead of later when you desperately need the skills. Well up to this point, she hasn't spent any of her spending money. So she brought $2.25 to the dollar store and I told her she had enough to get 2 things. I thought she would grab the first two things she saw and then beg for me to buy her some more, Oh no, she went throughout the whole store before carefully choosing two items. She gave them great thought and had a reason to purchase both. The monkey can Velcro around things and Abby has one that London has been forbidden to play with. So she has wanted one of her own. The wand was to replace a wand that Monty destroyed about six months ago. She has been asking for a wand ever since. I was so proud of her! She handed the cashier her money so adorably and was so excited that she got change back. I wish I could have filmed it all on camera. When we got out to the car I asked her if she thinks she should buy things every time she goes to the store. She replied, "no, cuz then I won't have any money." That's my girl!
Another great thing London did this week was she spelled out her first word on her own! She is really into sounding out and writing words, way more than just reading them out of books. Well usually she asks me to help her sound out the word. On Monday while Matt was packing for Grand Junction, she drew a picture of him and wrote SED on it. Then she showed us her masterpiece. She meant to spell out SAD because she was sad he was going on a work trip, but I was so incredibly proud of her for giving it her best shot on her own!