Mother’s Helper
Hello! My almost 10-year old is available as a mother’s helper. She is the oldest of three and is quite capable. She can fold and put away laundry, sweep, set tables, clean dishes, take out the trash, make beds, vacuum, make light meals, and keep your kiddo busy. We are a homeschool family so she has a flexible schedule. Please message me if you are interested in meeting with us.
Six hours later the Sheriff was knocking on our door. He was embarrassed and apologetic but said he had to do a welfare to check to make sure I wasn’t running a sweat shop! Apparently the ad generated multiple phone calls from paranoid neighbors thinking I was using my child as a slave.
I wrote back to Behar asking about her own reaction to this experience. She responded:
I was shocked that a friendly ad for a child wanting to help a neighbor generated multiple calls to the police and resulted in an actual visit by an officer. Fortunately, in our case, he was sympathetic, although he did leave with a warning that I should never post anything about my child wanting payment for her services.
But my ad was no different than the fliers I made 20 years ago with my friends offering yard work or babysitting. What if I had mentioned compensation? Would Child Protective Services be investigating me then? When I told a few fellow mommy-friends about our surprise visit, I felt judged. I was met with silence or questions like, “Would you actually leave your kid at a stranger’s house?”
The knee-jerk distrust of all adults around all kids is a hallmark of our times. Where we could see verve, we see vulnerability. Where we could see neighbors helping neighbors we imagine the worst. Where we could see kids growing up with confidence and competence, we see a rising tide of anxiety.
Letting kids do some work for money isn’t making them into slaves. It’s making them into adults. That shouldn’t be a crime.
ht/ js
I’d have to check out this household first before I let my 10 year-old daughter spend time over there all day.
Would they feel better if the 10 year old wrote the ad herself?
Something to do with home school maybe???
OneLastTime, my thought, too. Because homeschooling is a social crime and stuff to the progs.
Remember when kids on bicycles delivered newspapers?
Her ad mentioned that interested people should call if “they would like to meet with us”. I’m presuming that means meet the kid and the mother or father where the vetting would likely be more on the potential customer then the kid. Regarding working for money in the ad I wonder whether it would make a difference to mention that the kid was working to pay for a new mountain bike or some such thing that would indicate the kid is working for themselves.
Kudos to this little girl, already out to make her fortune at the tender age of nine. Take note, progtards this is how parenting is done
Should have posted her Union membership number and all would have been O.K.
word of mouth would be better because times have changed.
I started my lawn mowing service (manual, not motorized) when I was that age. But mommy didn’t make the flyers. It was based on me door knocking.
But that was 50 years ago, which seems light years ago.
I developed many long time clients because I worked hard for cheap. Eventually paid for a power mower. Power edger.
It’s what built my work/reward effort. Able to buy a haircut as opposed to being sheared by dad. Buy my own clothes. The blue wide ribbed corduroy bell bottoms were extremely cool. OK. I was never photographed in them, fortunately.
I feel tremendously blessed to have been raised before helicopter parents and child protective services. Especially considering that the whippings I did get were mostly deserved and were instructive.
And the day the Mexican woman hired me to kill 2 of her chickens for $ brought excitement and pandemonium to myself and every kid on the block. City slicker
Little kids with knives and hammers running around her backyard. She got her money’s worth in pure entertainment looking out her window and those chickens must’ve tasted like hell.
I use to go over to the old lady’s house on the corner when I was 8 years old and pulled weeds. I hated that job because of the spiders, but I did it. Then 2 years later, I babysat Mrs. Hansen’s kids. They were already in bed when I got there, but the place was a frickn mess! She left me piles of laundry to fold on the couch, the kitchen was piled high with dirty dishes and ants all over the place. She was a PIG! My oldest sister refused to babysit for her because of the mess. I prided myself for leaving the kitchen spotless, and to this day, my kitchen is the same way. Mrs. Hansen’s kitchen taught me a lesson. So, these memories stick in my mind, and I bet that 10-year old will have fond memories of her earning some pocket change. To those criticizing the mother, that’s what’s wrong with their generation, they’ve never accepted any responsibility for anything, they always hide behind the word FEAR.
Gold Fox get’s it…
I mowed lawns when I was 10
and I was dam good at it.There were no
weed whackers back then.I could get the left
edge of the push mower deck so close to a
tree that you would think a weed whacker did
that! $3.50 a lawn in ’64. 35 to 50 bucks now.
I also picked up soda bottles for 2-3-5 cents.
When I had enough money I bought a Sabre brand
knife made in Japan out of the display case in
7-11…. A 10 year old could carry a pocket knife back
then and yes,I carried it to school 5th thru 12th
every day.
I delivered the morning paper early in the morning 50 yrs. ago when I was 13 and 14. I walked my route because it was only a mile or so from my house and I bought a real nice Schwinn Stingray bike with that money for about $70 or so. And I remember the time when we home schooled our kids and I took them to lunch at a buffet and all the old people stared at us like we were freaks because we are at lunch during school hrs. I also worked for my dad at the gas station from the time I was 14 till I was 18 (Summers, weekends and after school) and moved away from home. Working at a young age never killed anyone, it helped develop good working skills for me and taught me the value of hard work even though there were times I grumbled about it at times because all the other kids were supposedly having more fun than me.
Frank Bass- “Remember when kids on bicycles delivered newspapers?”
I was 6 years old when I got my first paper route. Sunday morning papers only, and I had to have the small route done in time to get to Church and Sunday School.
I saved money from that route, and it was how I got my first bicycle.
Well, they, the leftists, can’t grow a helpless dependence addicted population of adults if they allow parents to instill self reliance & a work ethic in their children. They might actually become mature Independant adults and not stay forever young and willing parasites on society.
BUTTHEADICUS, I used to take my pocket knife to Catholic grade school. One day, a nun wanted everyone to empty their pockets because she was looking for contraband candy, etc. Out came my small pocket knife. “Nice knife,” and she moved on. Turns out a lot of the boys had knives, and that was fine with the school. Hey, boys carry pocket knives. That’s what boys do. What happened to that world?
A lot of new bicycles bought by industrious kids here! Mine was a $100.00, hunter green, ten speed. I never missed a chance to go look at it at the store and knew every inch of that sleek, fast, beautiful giver-of-freedom-from-walking. Paid for mostly by baby-sitting (@$.50/hour), but also doing any odd job that presented itself — inventory at a hardware store began my life-long love of hardware stores. And there was painting, berry picking, house cleaning and the like.
As PHenry said, once a kid knows that there are people out there who will actually PAY for whatever it is they can do (and even some things they don’t yet know how to do), the smart ones are all in on that action!
And speaking of smart kids: My daughter came to me — just before she graduated from HS — and thanked me for making her pay for her own first car AND the insurance for it. She said that it really spurred her to find a job (she actually leveraged two prior after-school jobs into a fairly good-paying job while in HS), and she thought it gave her a leg up on her peers. She said that even though she didn’t like it at the time, she discovered that it was really the only way she would have had the gumption to find a way to afford her own car and she was very proud of her accomplishment. B.I.N.G.O.!
Parents who hover or give too much are stealing necessary developmental opportunities from their children. When you take those things away from them, it should come as no surprise when they can’t “grow up.” How can they?
I was babysitting a two year old boy and his six month old brother when I was 10. Five nights a week. Made them dinner, bathed them, put them to bed and watched TV (which we didn’t have at my house), and was thrilled to get 50 cents an hour! Cannot find a teenager trustworthy, or capable, enough to watch my own little boy now. Oddly, even teens that I know in low income families, don’t seem to need the money.
If she lived in my neighborhood, that little girl would have a job today!
where were these CPS investigators when a ten year old was dancing around and receiving tips from a bunch of perverts in a gay bar?