Q: I pay my kids allowance, but they are getting lazy with their chores – any idea how to change their attitudes?

A: For some kids, their reward, aka allowance, needs to be given after small amounts of work.

I would suggest making a job chart with a list of chores that you expect them to do daily.

Have your child check them off or place a sticker in the box as the job is completed. This is especially effective for younger children.

They are more about instant gratification than older children. For example, if you pay your seven-year-old $7 per week, try paying her $1 daily instead.

Also, I think it’s fair to expect less from your younger kids than the older ones.

You can start small to get them excited about their chores. The tasks for a five-year-old could be making their bed, helping clear off the dishes after dinner, and picking up their toys.

If the basement is very messy, sometimes I will put on some fast music and we’ll dance around and clean up as fast as we can.

Another quick team work strategy is to tell my kids they have to pick up the basement in 10 minutes. I set a timer, they all laugh and run around, and they always manage to get it done.

How about letting your child help decide what chores they want to do?

For some reason, my six-year-old enjoys straightening up the shoe closet. Since I hate that job, it’s a win-win to make that ‘her’ job.

Generally speaking, kids like to feel like they are working toward the greater good. Experiment until you find what motivates your kids the best. Good luck!

The Ask the Mama blog was originally started over two years ago as a video blog, where I would review various products for moms in videos.

The videos would be posted to YouTube, and some of them caught on pretty well, like one for Bravado Nursing Bras that got over 5,000 views.

I also made videos about the Boppy Pillow, Halo Sleepsack, and other product reviews for moms.

It was becoming a chore to put together the videos, so that version of the blog eventually went away.

But now I am back, and I will be blogging regularly about managing kids, the household, money, and all sorts of other things that tie back into the day to day challenges of a mom.

Got any questions you’d like me to answer? Ask me on my site and I’ll answer in a future blog post. Don’t worry – your name won’t be mentioned.

It has been an uphill battle to get our kids to help around the house.

We have tried everything from sticker charts to bean counters. Finally, we came up with a system that works.

Each kid is expected to contribute to the house. They have a list of chores to complete daily, and on Sunday they get paid. The rate is based on their age x $1/week. So our 11-year-old gets $11/week, 8-year-old gets $8/week, etc.

It works out fairly well, since the older kids do the more difficult chores, and the items they tend to want are more expensive (electronics vs. dolls).

The system here works like the real world. If they don’t do their job, they don’t get paid. I think it’s a valuable lesson and teaches them the value of a dollar.

Sometimes I will offer them opportunities to make extra money during the week. For example, someone will dust while another will clean up the shoe closet.

This is a big motivator for them. My 8-year-old is saving up for her own iPod Touch, and her desire for this expensive item has been helpful on many levels.

She volunteers to do extra chores, and she has been great about saving her allowance each week.

Prior to this goal, she would spend her money on smaller items like Japanese Erasers and Silly Bandz.

I used to be more lenient about buying them little items here and there. But now that they get allowance, they are starting to understand how little amounts add up.

If they ask for something like stickers or a pack of gum, I say, “sure, you can buy it… with your own money.”

That will usually give them pause. Sometimes they will and sometimes they won’t make the purchase.

I feel like them having use their own money is helping them realize that money doesn’t grow on trees.

We try to work charity into their allowance as well. One day at their school they were collecting for some underprivileged kids. I told the kids that I would match whatever amount they were willing to donate.

I was pleasantly surprised at how willing they were to donate some of their money.

I didn’t tell them how much they had to give, but they were all very generous.

It’s never too early to teach kids about earning, saving, and spending.

I was peeking around a fiverr.com, where people will do all sorts of crazy things for five dollars, and I thought it would be fun to get a cartoon of myself.

Well, here it is…

The cartoon was based on this picture…

What’s up with those legs? I guess cartoons add 10 pounds.

Hi, I’m Vicky Collins, and I am stay-at-home mother of four. I am here to share things I’ve learned and help out where I can.

I have handled the finances for my family for the 14 years I’ve been married, as well as for my husband’s marketing company since it launched in 2004.

In addition to day to day money matters, I have been hands-on with the purchase and sale of several houses, family investments, and my children’s college plans.

Back when I graduated from the University of Maryland with a B.S. in Psychology in 1993, I was saddled with credit card debt and student loans.

But I was determined not to be plagued by credit card debt, so I diligently worked to pay off my cards and have not carried credit card debt since she I got married.