How to Teach Your Kids About Money

We talk about teaching our kids skills such as cooking and laundry in preparation for the "real world", but what about money management? One of the greatest gifts my parents gave me was teaching me how to be money savvy from a young age. From shopping and couponing together to finding a job for each stage of life (babysitting to retail to teaching and a whole lot in between) and donating a portion of our income, they walked alongside us. We talked about mortgages and knew the Christmas present budget – money was discussed naturally throughout our daily conversations.

Being Power Smart and Saving Money

As a biologist and frugal mama, the combination of saving money and the environment are things that I really care about. Several years ago we learned about the Team Power Smart program which provided another incentive to try and reduce our energy usage as there are cash rewards. We were successful in the first year and continued to maintain that usage and therefore the rewards continued. How were we able to decrease our overall energy usage by 28% in that first year? BC Hydro has a fantastic list for saving electricity and these are the ones that we follow:

1. Blankets. The temperature in our home is a little lower than most in order to save but also because we have a very active family who always seem to be warm from running around. We love having extra blankets on our couch. Not only does it make our home look cozier, it sure feels that way too! We will often cuddle under them to read books or watch a family movie. Don't forget that slippers are awesome, too.