Call me cheapskate, I don't really spend much on my children. Even when my wife and I buy toys or clothes for them, we think REAL hard.

Okay, to be fair, we do spend on items that we think are important like books. But not thousands of dollars on your child’s first and second birthdays.

Are you spending too much on your children and sacrifice your own needs like retirement?

If you are, you may want to do something about it. Trent of The Simple Dollar has written an excellent article on this.

But first, does spending less on your child mean you don’t love him?

Trent has this to say, “My job as a parent is to love my child, yes. But another big part of my job as a parent - and perhaps even more important - is to teach my child how to be a successful, functional person.”

In the article, you’ll find out Trent’s five basic principles about money, for parents:

1. If I can’t explain the reasoning behind a purchase to my child, then I won’t make the purchase.
2. I look strongly at how financial moves will affect my family now and later.
3. I involve my children in all financial choices as early as possible.
4. I don’t spend money on him without a clear purpose.
5. I use the smile factor to judge if his childhood is in fact a happy one.
   

• Teaching Children About Money

Check out my guest post on Tiffany’s fantastic blog, Nature Moms:

30 Ways to Go Green with Your Family

You’ll find some simple ideas that you and your family can use to create a greener family.

Note: It’s only after reading Tiffany's blog that I now seriously consider putting natural living in my family as much as possible.

• Total exhaustion after delivery
• Producing not enough milk
• Guilt of not giving breast milk but formula
• How she turned from 60% formula to fully breast milk
• No nursing room when she started work
  

What struck me first was the title.

First $1 or less.

Second without the TV.

Move over Tickle Me Elmo or Lego building blocks or computer games. It’s grateful to realize that you can still do something with young children without burning a hole in your pocket and TV.

Some of them are classic games that I used to play before, of course, when I was younger. They are still fun even at my age now.

Check out Brad Isaac’s list:

10 ways to entertain young children for $1 or less (without the TV)

Seriously, I have never thought things like this could happen.

It’s sad to find out that a 7-year old child has been struggling to be accepted by a school. Simply because Wong Bi Jun is a special needs child.

Her mother seeking frantically (both private schools and international schools) for a school that will accept her but to no avail. Everyone, upon hearing that she has a delay in development, gives excuses not to enroll her.

Isn’t it ironic? A school is supposed to help children to better equip themselves with knowledge and skills. But in this case, not only did the schools reject the child’s application to be a student, they gave no encouragement but snide remarks.

For example, I quote this from the story:

“One principal from a private school even told me that she hated to deal with special needs students and that such students were actually handicapped and not special needs.”

How could a school principal make such a heartbreaking statement? Shame on her!

I pity the mother and now she doesn’t know where to turn to for help. I think something has gone wrong somewhere that needs to be corrected for such a thing to happen.

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Follow on note (July 20th): Some parents responded to the story by giving suggestions to deal with this particular issue. They speak from their own experiences. Bravo!