Today, I had a 2 year old girl named Jane hand me $100 in cash, money that she earned herself, for a set of educational kids books that she really wanted.

In my conversation with her mom, I found out that Jane, at the age of two years old, had already earned hundreds of dollars for herself doing hard work, all sitting in three cute kid sized piggy banks. She had made so much money that she couldn't fit it all into one!

How Jane made her money was not through the traditional ways of collecting money from birthday or Christmas presents. It was very different than any other toddler.

In fact, she worked for it.

Jane would walk along the edge of a golf course with her dad once a week and collect golf balls.

She would then go home and wash and scrub the golf balls until they were good as new.

When they were all clean, her dad and her would sort the golf balls by quality and quantity.

High quality golf balls were packaged into sets of 6 in egg cartons and cheaper quality golf balls were packaged into sets of 20's. How Jane made her money would be through selling it to whoever wanted golf balls!

Her parents emphasized to Jane that with anything she wanted, she could have, as long as it came out of her own piggy bank.

This basic lesson of working for what you want is invaluable, and to teach it to your kids at such a young age is phenomenal.

Not only did Jane get to pay cash for the books, but she also realized the lesson of trade-offs. She would have to sacrifice the money she had been saving for a new swing set to buy the books that I had. She thought about it for a while, then nodded to her mom, that yes, she wanted the books and would work harder to get her swing set.

Owning your decisions at an early age put my choices as an adult to shame!

To Jane, thank you for the simple lesson that you shared about working hard for what you want. You're gonna do great kid! 

As we head into mom's week, I'm reminded of the hard work and love 
that my mother puts into our family, like the late nights of caring for us 
when we're sick, or making our meals - both for dinner and for lunch the next day. 

Not to mention the super knowledge that my mom has in knowing where everything I misplaced is.
Then you've got the awareness of knowing when the deadlines for my dentist appointments are, 
the attention and loving ability to listen when we need it most, when we're at our lowest,
contrasted by the proud acknowledgement when we excitedly tell her about our personal bests. 

Then I think about all the patience my mom has in putting up with my random ventures or my quirky pet peeves, 
and the trust and faith she has when I tell her I'm going to do something new. 

For all the moms in my sales area, 
I want you to know that I appreciate the fact that being a mom is the hardest job in the world, 
because I've experienced first hand seeing my mom work her BUTT off EVERYDAY 
for me and my brother and never expecting a thing in return. 

I want to thank you for doing an amazing job, 
because even though you may not be acknowledged every day for it, we love and appreciate you. 

You are the reason we are the people we are, because it's either good genes or good parenting, and both ways, that's a role you've played! 

This week, I will treat every mom I meet as my very own, because I know my mom will be proud that I did.

To all the moms, thank you for doing what you do. 
To my mom, this week is for you. 


Love, 
from me and SWCalgary