The Stash

If there's one thing that works to get my kiddos to behave, it's bribery. Probably not the greatest of parental ideas, but I find that the behavior does improve, however slightly, if they know there is a reward at the end.

Typically, when the kids are piling back into their seats in the car, getting their buckles together, I will quite often hear one or both of the kids ask, "Mom, can I have a pink candy?" A pink candy is just a peppermint round candy that has been obtained from the stash in the glove compartment. These pink candies come from the best of all places, Sonic. When cheerfully handed my drink, there is a pink candy on the drink. I throw it into the stash and be on my merry little way. Often times, I have asked for an entire handful or a small cup full of pink candies to continue to have the necessary stash for bribery purposes.

Owen sits in the back of our van. When he has earned his pink candy, I toss it to him. I've thought this whole time he was doing as I asked and putting the wrapper in the cupholder of his carseat. Boy, was I ever wrong. It just so happens that Adam cleaned out the van this past weekend and found the stash of wrappers. He said they just kept coming and coming and coming. He decided to count them. All in total - 51 wrappers of pink candies!!!!!

I told Adam I don't know what is funnier - the fact that he sat there and counted each and every wrapper or that Owen was stashing them not in his cupholder, but rather in the seat back pocket of the seat in front of him. There were enough wrappers that it filled an entire sandwich ziploc bag full. I'll have to remember the next time that the kids are acting up in the store and not listening to me, running off onto the next thing that has caught their eye, or just having a meltdown, that although they weren't the best behaved in the store on that particular trip, there were 51 other occasions that they were well behaved and earned their pink candy. Maybe the next trip will result in the start of another stash.