For weeks before her eleventh birthday my daughter hinted, asked, and begged to have a cell phone. My husband told her that he was going to give her a wheelbarrow for her birthday.
She played along at first, then got annoyed, then had a heart to heart talk with us where she said that she was "on to us" and that she knew that wheelbarrow = cellphone.
So at her birthday dinner celebration, he went out to his car and pulled out the wheelbarrow. He actually bought her a wheelbarrow. AND. inside of it was a sparkly purple cellphone. Amazing. She was beside herself. We talked through the rules of a cellphone - and he told her that the calls were limited, no internet, and she could have only 200 texts a month.
I sent her the first text saying Happy Birthday and she said to me in the car - Mom - i am not going to respond because I do not want to waste one of my texts. Is that OK? Yes it is OK.
Now she has been in Chicago for ten days with my husband, and while we have had FACE TIME twice, she has not called me once. The only text she sent asked me to send her a photo of Daisy - our dog. When I did, she said thank you. So far, so good.
Just got word that her new friends at camp told her that her Dad is torturing her - as they send at least 200 texts a day.
We will monitor it closely, give reigns as they are earned, and relish in the fact that she is acting responsibly.
