aunt patty pays for A's!

About 2 months before school ended for the summer I found out some of my young nephews were not doing as well as they could be in school. So when I went up to Ventura to do our photo shoot I also called a family meeting. Young Nico was finishing up 2nd grade but was struggling a bit with his reading. Tommy just wasn't spending as much time on his studies as he needed & would be starting high school in the fall. Jason was ending his junior year & I knew grades are really important for college so didn't want him to get lazy!
Bribery is made out to be a bad thing for some reason so with all of the parents permission I made deals with each kid! Tommy & Lili agreed to work with little brother Nico to practice his reading. There would be a pay off to all three kids if he got up to 2nd grade reading level by the end of school. Then we agreed that Tommy & Jason would both be paid for every A on their report card! I prefer to call this motivation instead of bribery! But no matter what you call it all the kids stepped up & made the grades!
When it was payoff time I made each kid a card, wrote them a special note and added the cash! These are the cards the boys got...

  And this one was for Lili... our only girl... and thank goodness she loves bling!

I am happy to add that all 5 of the kids are doing great this fall in school! Little Micah is in Kindergarten this year and doing very well in math like his big brother Jason! Lili will probably have straight A's! Nico knows he needs to keep practicing his reading, he is such a good boy! Tommy is in marching band and loves it! Jason is playing football again & enjoying all the senior year activities. These kids all rock!