We ran into this with K (my now-18 year old) when she was small. I was quite strict. I let her watch TV, but we had a rule that she was not to even ask about toys from commercials. That if she got to nagging about toys from commercials she saw on television, I'd reconsider letting her watch television. The exceptions: Christmas and birthday wish lists, and her own money. If she earned or was gifted money, she could use it how she saw fit. She could earn pocket change doing chores, and was gifted a reasonably substantial $ amount ($50-100) by her distant grandparents once or twice a year. If she wanted something bad enough to buy it herself or remember it long enough to put it on a list, it would be considered. There were a lot of things I just didn't let her do, some of which I don't even remember telling her not to do, but which she told her friends I'd told her not to do anyway... (Notable example... friend turns on Britney Spears video... K pipes up with "My mom wouldn't want me to watch that." I don't think I'd ever said word one to her about BS, but she was right...)
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When she was in 1st grade, Pokemon was becoming HUGE. Huge. And collectible cards were huge among her friends. Kids would brag about the cards they got that week, and the cards they were going to get. We sat down and talked about it at one point, and I asked if getting all those cards made those kids happy with what they had, or if they just wanted more and more... and she realized that all the "stuff" wasn't making those kids any happier than her. And for Christmas, I bought her a pikachu keychain...which she adored, and was happy with. Happier, in fact, than those boys with the books and books of neatly arranged cards. When she got her own money, she thought about buying cards, or saving up for a gameboy and a Pokemon game. She saved up... and you know what? 10-12 years later? She's STILL sometimes playing that pokemon game with some of her friends. The lesson I was after, and the one she got, was that it wasn't wrong to want something, or to save up and buy something, even something relatively frivolous like a video game, but it was vitally important that she maximize the value of the things she was purchasing. That she focus on things that she would use often and for a long time, that she look for things that would hold up well over time. She bought one "TV toy" once that got old about 20 minutes after she started playing with it...and cost $20. And we talked about that, too. She learned to try things out before buying them.Â
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We do have video game consoles. And she does spend time playing. But it's always in balance... during the school year, video games can never be more important than school.
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She had 'friends' who criticized her for eating meat, in grade school. The kid is allergic to soy, egg, peanut and dairy. So she eats meat. We had to talk about the underlying "Why" of things, and the importance of eating a balanced, nutritious diet that makes your body healthy, and that not every way of eating works for every person. And she learned the hard lesson that some people are too shallow to waste the effort of being friends with. Anyone who didn't want to take the time to understand that there were medical reasons she couldn't eat the way they did wasn't really worth her time either.Â
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She said to me once, in middle school, "Mom, I'm really glad I'm not one of the popular kids. Because I have friends, and I know they're my friends because they really like me, and not just because I'm 'cool'."
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When it came down to it, there were hills to die on and battles not worth fighting. Hair color is a battle not worth fighting in any kid too young to be needing a job. Tattoos are another story. Insisting on waiting to puberty or age 12 for ear piercing was a reasonable limit. But we never, ever did anything just to give her bragging rights or to make her seem "cool". Cool was never a goal, because the last thing I ever want for my kid is for her to be making a lot of choices based on peer pressure.
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When I started wanting more brand name clothes, my parents put me on a clothing budget and let me buy my own stuff... but when the money was gone, it was gone.Â
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When my husband was being made fun of in school because his jeans were an unpopular brand, his mother went through and removed all the external brand labels... and it solved the problem.
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Whenever something came up that seemed "uncool", we took the logical approach. One of the neighbor boys once asked why my daughter wore a helmet when none of the other kids on the street did. I just smiled and said, "She likes her brain and doesn't want it to get hurt if she falls off her bike." As one of the boys was currently wearing an arm cast due to breaking his arm falling off a bike, this hit home, and suddenly a lot of kids on the street were wearing bike helmets.
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If a kid were to say to your daughter, "You don't get to stay up late?", I'd encourage her to say, "I like getting enough sleep, it lets me have more fun during the day."
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As for the "splash out" issue... there are lots of ways to have a fun party without spending a ton of money, and lots of fun things to do or places to go that aren't very expensive. I was pretty much broke until my daughter was about 10 years old, and we still had parties, they just didn't involve hired clowns or bouncy castles. They involved homemade cupcake cones that the kids decorated themselves, and music, and maybe playing outside or in a pool. We had a policy that even-year parties could involve a fair number of friends and would be daytime things, and odd year parties were sleepovers with a few friends.Â
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By the time I was in high school, the kids with the super permissive (and often absent or distant) parents were actually a little wistful about those of us whose parents were NOT so "cool", but were more present. "My parent lets me get away with crap that isn't very good for me" at some point stops being a bragging right. "My parent loves me enough to set limits" is not a bad thing at all. That said, I do believe in moderation, and that means some flexibility about occasional treats, the occasional late bedtime, etc. I don't like "eat all the candy you want", but "No candy ever" also sets up a potential unhealthy dynamic. "You can go out trick or treating, but no more than two pieces of candy per night for X nights and then the rest goes away" Â sets up a much more maintainable life lesson in the long run. Then again, I did let my kid have all the candy she wanted, once. She threw up and then decided for herself that the original limit made more sense.Â
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" by JoAnn Deak. I thought it was very thoughtful. I got it when we were having some peer exclusion issues and cattiness to deal with in 3rd grade. I thought it gave a much more balanced view than the much talked about "Queen Bees and Wannabees" (not for me). "Girls Will Be Girls" addresses the girl friendship issues starting from about age 7 up through teen-dom. I thought it was especially strong in the tween middle years section.
