Last night Alexandra announced at dinner, "Mom, I've been thinking and I don't think I am going to go to school this year."
Kenneth looks at me with a look like, "so, what are you going to do with this one honey?"
Nicholas stops eating in mid bite and looks with wide eyes as if to say, "oh no Allie you have done it this time."
Without missing a beat (and you all would be so proud of me), I say, "okay, if you have really been thinking hard about this and you are serious about not going to school this year, then you don't have to go."
"Really? I can stay home?", she asks.
"No you can't stay home because you aren't allowed to stay by yourself yet, and since Daddy and I have to work you can go with Daddy to work everyday." Kenneth still keeps silent.
"Now of course, since you aren't going to be in school anymore then you will have to start paying rent here and helping out with the bills, so it will be important for you to work hard so you can earn enough money to help us out."
"Okay," she says, "I can work with Daddy."
Kenneth then says, "We will drop off Nicholas and Caroline at the bus stop in the mornings and the you and I can go right to work." (for those of you who don't know, Kenneth does lawn care and maintenance, so this isn't a desk job but manual labor mostly.)
And I add, "You don't have to wait for school to start to start working for Daddy. He has a job tomorrow and you can start then." She smiles and agrees.
This morning at the breakfast table, Kenneth reminds her that she is working with him today and she said she remembered. They, then worked out a fair payment schedule and an hourly rate.
Two hours after they left to trim some bushes at a customer's house they return. Allie walks in and gives me a big hug and says I am going back to school now. Nothing else was said.
We were willing to play this out, even though it didn't take us long to convince her that school was the best choice. We were even willing to go as far as not sending her to school on the first day of school and having her work with Kenneth, but luckily she saw the light early.
3 comments:
Ooohhh, that was good. hope you and yours have a blessed evening.
Laura
That is such a good story. What a neat why do deal with it. I going to have to remeber this one.
now the bigger question is what are you going to do if caroline says it? she might not see the light of day with all the bugs outside and everything.
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