Unboxing the Kids
Sitting at the dinner table Friday night, Stretch (our oldest who is now growing inches overnight) says that he has found the newest and latest way to save money. Really? "Teach kids to swallow pills. Tablets and capsules are less expensive than liquids and they taste better too." You know, I've heard of some interesting money saving ideas, but that's not one I would have thought of. Leave it to a active-minded 13 year old to come up with something like that.
His comment got me thinking. I took an informal poll at the Messenger house to see what other money saving ideas the munchkins might offer...
- Sell all the toys and only play with sticks from the yard. (Well, everything except the Legos.)
- Don't use soap or shampoo when you bath. (Hey! Just give up bathing altogether, right?)
- Save the hair from home hair cuts and weave it into fabric.
- Make your own wedding and engagement rings from a tin can and pretty stones from the backyard.
- Use ice cream for whipped cream. (Not sure how that's frugal...)
- Make paint rollers out of your old clothes.
- Make homemade paper for drawing by cutting up your homeschool textbooks. (har, har, har... not!)
- Make paint brushes from cut hair.
- Use lamb leg bones as tomahawks.
- Grow flax so you can weave your own linen and string. (I'll run right down to Home Depot and pick up the seed... How about you?)
- For your homeschool science project, figure out how to harvest methane from bodily emissions, convert to fuel and use it in the car. (U.S. fuel crisis solved!)
- Sell the stove, cook in the backyard over a bonfire with gathered, fallen wood.
- Use the bonfire to melt tin cans to make silverware.
- Turn old clothes into baby and doll clothes.
- Make dinner plates and bowls out of fallen trees. (We can sell the current dinnerware on e-Bay!)
- Keep worms under the kitchen sink to make compost.
- Compost your homeschool books to grow better tomatoes. (I'm still not laughing...)
- Cool your drinks with snow.
- Grow your own tomatoes. (And no doubt use your homeschool textbooks to mulch them...)
- Instead of buying your own horse, go to your best friend and borrow one.
- Eat less and you save on the grocery budget.
- If you don't eat so much, you'll lose weight and you won't have to pay for some diet program. (Oh if it were only so simple... Wait a minute. Is that a hint??)
- If you dig a hole in your backyard, be sure to check for diamonds. (Apparently people have commonly done so in Brazil, Australia and Africa. ok, I'll be looking next time I get the shovel out...)
- Turn old socks into puppets.
- Use acorn tops for whistles.
- Create dice from scrap tile.
Some of the ideas are winners and others aren't. (I like the science project the best! lol) Kids are creative. If you ask, they might actually come up with great money saving ideas that never occurred to you. If you are able to actually use an idea, with or without major modifications, it will help make them feel like they are contributing to the family. Building a strong family tie is very definitely, absolutely and completely frugal. 
I'm curious to know what kind of money saving ideas YOUR kids come up with!
P.S. Moms, any advice? How did you get your kids to swallow pills? I've got 3 down and one that just "can't," but neither could I so...
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12 Responses to “Unboxing the Kids”
March 26th, 2008 at 7:44 am
Hmmm, on the pill thing have you tried the old “put the pill in a spoonful of jelly and swallow the whole thing”? That’s what my mom used to do. I’ve also done it with a spoon of honey.
March 26th, 2008 at 8:39 am
I have my children practice with M&Ms.
March 26th, 2008 at 8:43 am
To swallow a pill, put it in the back of your mouth, take a mouthfull of water, and bend over 90 degrees so you make a right angle. Swallow.
Your throat opens up so much you don’t notice the pill going down. It’s how my kids learned to swallow pills.
March 26th, 2008 at 10:32 am
Sorry to burst anyones bubble, but I went to a seminar on getting drugs out of the workplace. (I work in healthcare). The lady that led the seminar said that there have been studies done and the longer you can keep your children from swallowing pills the better. There is some correlation between the age they start swallowing pills and higher drug use. (It should go without saying that not every kids who swallows pills at an early age will become a drug user). I thought this was very interesting. I don’t have a link or anything, but might be worth looking into. I know her comments have stuck with me.
March 26th, 2008 at 10:53 am
I guess I will forever be drinking warm drinks.I live in North Carolina and it never snows!!
Turn old socks into puppets.-Probably the most realistic idea up there.
My son was around 10 years old before he started taking pills,so no help there.
March 26th, 2008 at 11:03 am
Drug stores sell pill-grinders for about $3.
Grind the pill into a fine powder, then sprinkle onto a bowl of applesauce. Or (if the medicine doesn’t taste too horrible, mix powder with a spoonful of chocolate syrup.
My children did this for almost a year with a medicine that did not come in a liquid version.
March 26th, 2008 at 11:23 am
My husband’s mother had him practice with cherrios. They are the right size and disintegrate before they get stuck in your throat.
I think that age has a lot to do with swallowing pills. I thought that my youngest would never learn and then one day he was just old enough to do it on his own.
March 26th, 2008 at 2:34 pm
I second the M&Ms, but also have their favorite drink to help them “practice.”
And Lura, I agree for the most part, but sometimes, children really do have to take medicine. For example, my youngest who has a history of kidney reflux and takes a preventative antibiotic every single day. Right now, it’s in liquid form, but who knows what our future holds?
Melinda
March 26th, 2008 at 3:54 pm
That list is hilarious! You have very creative kids!
I couldn’t swallow pills at all, no matter how small. I also couldn’t eat apples with the peel still on because it got caught in my throat. It wasn’t for lack of trying; my tonsils were just too big. Once they were removed, I could swallow pills and eat apples, and actually, a whole new world of food opened up to me. I didn’t eat much before because swallowing was never easy.
March 26th, 2008 at 5:55 pm
Those are great!! Very creative (especially trying to get out of homeschooling?)
March 26th, 2008 at 7:32 pm
I can’t remember taking pills when I was young, but I do remember making EVERYTHING out of big cardboard boxes (free from the stores), and doll beds out of oatmeal cartons. My Mother grew up in the depression and really knew how to work what we had.
March 31st, 2008 at 8:45 am
LOL, I’m eager to see your woven hair and flax creations! I like the ice cream/whipped cream substitution (frugal? no, but yummy, yes), and I’m sure you’ll grow lovely tomatoes with all those homeschool books- now why didn’t I think of that?
As for pills, I could never do it as a kid. What I did was practice at dinnertime, swallowing peas and corn whole. Eventually, I moved on to very small pills, like Gravol, or painkillers cut in half. I’m not really into medications anymore, and I realize your thinking vitamins, so perhaps you can find a vitamin that is very small, just to get them started?
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