I'm Proud Of My Boy After One Of Life's Had Lessons

When I came home from work today I was greeted by a forlorn son. I asked him what the problem was and he looked sheepishly over his shoulder in the direction of his lunchbox. Inside the lunchbox was his unfinished lunch. Thinking that he hadn't eaten his lunch, which angers me greatly, I told him off.

Let's go to the start of the story. Last night at taekwondo they hadn't out boxes of 48 Caramello koalas to volunteers who wished to sell them for fundraising. My boy was one of the quickest to raise his hand. This morning he took 20 to school and I thought that he might sell 10 as I didn't think that many kids would have too much money to spend. They were priced at $1 each and they are of a decent size so the price is reasonable. He sold all 20. They were very popular with the kids. Even his maths teacher bought two.

The reason he was so downcast was because he only had $18.05 for his efforts. Either some kids cheated him by using five cent coins instead of 10 cents or he didn't count the money properly. For whatever reason he was short. The reason I am proud of his is that he didn't ask me to make up for the shortfall but went to his piggy bank and made it up himself. Not only is he raising money for someone other than himself but he takes the fall for the shortcomings. I've heard of parents bailing their children out for traffic infringements and the like when the kids are adults but my eight year old has a decent head on his shoulders. And he will learn a great lesson from this. Tomorrow he intends to take the 28 remaining chocolates to sell but will ensure that he is given the correct money before handing over the goods.

Reminds me of my motto - "Don't Trust Any Bastard".

MS Readathon - The Boy Is Fundraising

When I was a boy, some time ago now, all the kids in school were invited to take part in the MS Readathon. It's a charitable event whereby you read books and gather sponsorship money. All the money raised goes to the MS Australia - Multiple Sclerosis Australia. Back in my day you gathered sponsorship for each book that you read. Once your month of reading was done you collected the sponsorship money and handed it in. If you reached a certain level of sponsorship you received a prize which gave you an incentive. I read a few of the Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy books, among others. The first novel took me only two days as I was so keen.

Yu-Jin has decided to take part in this years MS Readathon which is very pleasing. In the first two days he read three books! Alas he only received one donation, which was mine to kickstart him, and he's eagerly looking for sponsors. If you would like to sponsor Yu-Jin please go to his MS Readathon Homepage - https://www.msreadathon.org.au/member/?HPID=440281 - and you can use a range of credit cards to do so. Remember, if you are an Australian taxpayer any donations of $2 or more are tax deductible. I'll keep a list of the books he has read updated.

Just this morning we checked his fundraising page and some dear friends, the Cutlers, had donated $20 each! Well, that perked the boy up and he's read another book this morning and is starting a second. And they rubbed it in that the "old man had to dig a bit deeper".

Even if you can afford only a couple of dollars that will help. If not, send some encouragement.