Future Criminals?

Sometimes (all of the time) I wonder if I'm doing a good job raising my kids to be good people. Will they grow up to be productive members of society or will they end up robbing gas stations? I try to teach them empathy for others and that they are very lucky kids who have a lot more than most kids in the world but I often feel like these lessons are lost on them, especially since my two oldest kids can be downright horrible to each other.

There are glimmers of hope that I, in fact, am not as sucky a mom as I think I am.

My son's nursery school had a pajama day on Friday where they also had to bring in change to donate to a little girl in town who has cancer. I told my son about this, explaining that a little girl was sick and that we were going to give her money to help her. Randomly one night my son handed me a baggie full of change and dollar bills that he had been saving and said that he wanted to give it to the little girl.

I was so moved that my little boy, who at times makes me wish that I could run away with the circus, wanted to give his money to help someone else. When I told my husband about it I started to cry because I was so proud.

But now that I think about, my son is four and doesn't care about money so maybe giving it away didn't impact him in such a huge way. Oh well, donating is donating. He wasn't going to use it so he gave it to someone who would get better use from it. As long as I keep talking to my kids about why it is important to give to others they will eventually get it.