Subject: The Cost Of Children
From: Unicorn (unicorn@indenial.com)
Date: Sat Feb 15 2003 - 21:15:20 EST
"The Cost Of Children"
The government recently calculated the cost of
raising a child from birth to 18 and came up with
$160,140 for a middle income family. Talk about
sticker shock! That doesn't even touch college
tuition.. But $160,140 isn't so bad if you break it
down. It translates into:
$8,896.66 a year, $741.38 a month, or $171.08 a
week. That's a mere $24.24 a day! Just over a
dollar an hour. Still, you might think the best financial
advice says don't have children if you want to be "rich."
It is just the opposite.
What do your get for your $160,140?
1. Naming rights. First, middle, and last!
2. Glimpses of God every day.
3. Giggles under the covers every night.
4. More love than your heart can hold.
5. Butterfly kisses and Velcro hugs.
6. Endless wonder over rocks, ants, clouds, and warm
cookies.
7. A hand to hold, usually covered with jam.
8. A partner for blowing bubbles, flying kites, building
sand castles, and skipping down the sidewalk in the
pouring rain.
9. Someone to laugh yourself silly with no matter what
the boss said or how your stocks performed that day.
For $160,140.
1. You get to finger-paint, carve pumpkins, play hide-and-
seek, catch lightning bugs, and never stop believing in
Santa Claus.
2. You have an excuse to keep: reading the Adventures
of Pooh and watching Saturday morning cartoons, going
to Disney movies, and wishing on stars.
3. You get to frame rainbows, hearts, and flowers under
refrigerator magnets and collect spray painted noodle
wreaths for Christmas, hand prints set in clay for Mother's
Day, and cards with backward letters for Father's Day.
For $160,140, there is no greater bang for your buck.
1. You get to be a hero just for retrieving a Frisbee off the
garage roof, taking the training wheels off the bike, removing
a splinter, filling a wading pool, coaxing a wad of gum out of
bangs, and coaching a baseball team that never wins but
always gets treated to ice cream regardless.
2. You get a front row seat to history to witness the first
step, first word, first bra, first date, and first time behind
the wheel.
3. You get to be immortal.
4. You get another branch added to your family tree, and
if you're lucky, a long list of limbs in your obituary called
grandchildren.
5. You get an education in psychology, nursing, criminal
justice, communications, and human sexuality that no
college can match. In the eyes of a child, you rank right
up there with G~d. (Well, at least until they reach their
teenage years.)
6. You have all the power to heal a booboo, scare away
the monsters under the bed, patch a broken heart, police
a slumber party, ground them forever, and love them
without limits, so one day they will, like you, love without
counting the cost.
ENJOY YOUR KIDS AND GRAND KIDS. The best
blessings in life are family and friends
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