Playing with beercaps?

[stirringleaf]

my stbx lets ds have all his beercaps. i was picking him up the other day and ds has quite the collection growing. for some reason this really depreses me. when we were married we did not drink at all. after we split up we both have started drinking a little but i think my ex drinnks more than me. its not problematic as far as i can tell, just average beer at dinner stuff i guess. but i am not sure how i feel about letting ds play with beercaps, and the message it sends him. what do you think?

[mamaduck]

How old is he? As long as he's past the age of putting chokables in his mouth, it would not bother me.

But you know, if its bothering you -- then why don't you bring it up to your son and suggest an alternative? You can buy plain bottle caps by the gross. Maybe he'd make a trade with you.

[talk de jour]

I don't think there's anything wrong with it It's not like he's letting him drink out of empty beer bottles.

It's like... you wouldn't want your dc eating McD's all the time, but is there really anything wrong with playing with the box the fries come in? kwim?

[Sharlla]

Beer caps would fall in the "smaller than your elbow" catagory and would not be played with if it's a infant/toddler. I don't see what harm playing with beer caps would be for an older child, although I don't know why they would want to play with them anyway.

[fostermomcchr]

Both my boys went through a time of collecting beer bottle caps after we were v isiting relatives and they discovered them-I don't drink period, hubby rarely drinks, but neither of us is opposed to adults drinking. Anyway, the boys were like 7 & 12 and were having such a great time with them that the 12 hr drive home was a breeze. I guess about a week later, they had stopped messing with them and they got tossed out. They were pretty creative with them, sure beats being glued to video games!

[stirringleaf]

he is almost five. i think my concern is about sending him a message about drinking when he is older? or that its ok for us to drink? i dont know. thats why i asked though. i stopped drinking for 8 years because of my religion. i had very strong beliefs about it. i never felt it was bad that other people did it, but i just really thought i would never drink again. rightnow i drink pretty seldom, but i have been, so i think it is hypocritical of me to say anything to STBX, and i wasnt sure if my discomfort was really very valid or not. i have a little bit of guilty feelings about drinking because it is against my religion, and i dont want to impose those guilty feelings on other people... especially since i havent really figured out where i am at with it.

ds has fun collecting them, and likes to do stuff like spell his name on the coffeetable with them... they are fun to hold and he thinks they are treasures.

[fostermomcchr]

[QUOTE=

ds has fun collecting them, and likes to do stuff like spell his name on the coffeetable with them... they are fun to hold and he thinks they are treasures.[/QUOTE]

That is what my kids had fun doing too, I think it is ok to play with them, not a wrong message. If you prefer, get him some of those cardboard milk caps that he can decorate himself-I am not sure if they still sell them or not, but again, my son had those and loved coloring them and making games out of them.

[Jessy1019]

Since he's old enough not to choke on them, it sounds okay to me. If you drink occasionally, it doesn't really make sense to want to teach him that drinking isn't okay.

We don't have any family history of alcoholism and we are believers in moderation when it comes to alcohol. Our kids see us (generally me since dp doesn't care for it that much) having a margarita a couple times a month or having a beer with dinner once in a while . . . I think it's good for them to see that you can drink without getting drunk or acting goofy.

The bottle caps themselves seem like they would be great for encouraging creative play, especially since he likes to spell things out with them. I wouldn't take them away.

[amitymama]

I think it's worse to send the message that drinking is BAD because every kid I knew growing up whose parents had that attitude towards alcohol, the kids ended up drinking three times as much as other kids because they knew that it was the one thing their parents HATED and they were trying to rebel.

Teaching him about moderation and that alcohol can be enjoyed responsibly is the better option, IMO. And at this point, he's only playing with the caps. If he starts wanting to collect the bottles or becomes more interested in beer because of it, then sit him down and talk about it then. But right now it sounds like he's just having fun collecting something.

[UnschoolnMa]

Wouldn't bug me as long as he isn't likely to choke on them. We don't have a problem with alcohol.

[Mamma Christi]

I have to agree with PPs, as long as he isn't young enough to choke I wouldn't care. However, if you have a problem with them being messages from alcohol why don't you and your son go on a hunt for bottle caps? They're very hard to find these days, sadly, but you could always take a walk alongside a street together and see if you find any that aren't from beer! Or if he's old enough you could have him paint the ones that he has...he'd have fun painting AND they'd no longer have the beer logos visible!!

[cinnamonamon]

I understand why you feel that way, but I'd try to get past it & just see his enjoyment. I'll admit to being silly enough that I'd probably rather my boys didn't, say, bring a whopping huge bag full with them to a friend or relatives house, though... might give the friend/relative the wrong idea about you.

[Dar]

My daughter makes really cool earrings out of beer caps... sometimes I think the real reason she comes to department parties with me is to collect the beer caps.

dar

[mattemma04]

Recycle

Do a search for crafts with bottle caps.I can only recall one where you paint the caps,and string them together making a snake.If we had caps I would do some crafts

[cinnamonamon]

Hey, if you want to break it up a little bit, you could get some IBC branded root beer & give him those caps. Plus you get some yummy root beer out of it...