As both parents and financial advisors we believe it’s really important to talk about money with your kids, especially early on so they can start to grasp some of the concepts and understand the rules about money and what it can do.  With toddlers it’s a little more challenging because there’s only so much that they’re going to understand. These are our three boys Landon, 5 Fischer, 3 and then Duke is just about nine months old. With the two older boys one of the things we talk about with them is “what are the three things we can do with money”. Boys, what are the three things we can do with money? Spend, Give, and Save. That is one of the things that we do at this age, it’s really just focusing on understanding different ways you can treat money. If you want this to really resonate with your kids as they get older, as they get money, whether it’s from birthday or allowance or whatever, you can get clear jars and have them separate it out. Example, this jar is for spending, this jar is for saving and this jar is for giving. The reason you make it clear is for that save jar, they can watch that savings grow so it makes sense for them. The last thing we do with toddlers, other than just being open and talking about money, is helping them to understand the transfer of giving money away and receiving something else in return. When they do get their birthday money or something like that, even if it’s on a gift card, we take them to the store and let them choose a toy that’s within the dollar amount that they received, so they have to learn how to budget what they have. Also, when we go to check out, we actually make them give the dollar or the gift card to the cashier so that they can understand that they there giving something away to receive something else. That’s what we do with our toddlers, as they get older we will add to those concepts. Until next time don’t be afraid to take the Next Step, even with your family.