Raising Able. Susan Tordella

      Life lessons gained by growing up on a farm

      My five siblings and I worked together on a family farm in the 1950s and 1960s. My first outside chores were to gather eggs and tend the garden. Inside, I helped set the table and do dishes, starting at 2 years old.

      As I got older, I was in charge of gathering and burning the trash. My father started paying me for farm work when I was 10 -- cutting seed potatoes for 10 cents a basket. That year I started driving the tractor and spraying weeds for $1 an hour.

      I believe that the best way to impart your values to children is to work together.

      When I married, one of our goals was to re-create that environment for our four daughters, without having to feed and milk cattle twice a day in the freezing cold.

      We discovered that we had to be very intentional to create opportunities for working together that come naturally on a farm. Our daughters worked in our vegetable garden, raised and sold pumpkins and helped us with our business.

      Millie McNab Pocatello, Idaho

       www.christianvalueslegacy.com

      Sales training at Hurtte’s Texaco

      My dad owned Hurtte’s Texaco in Taylorville, Illinois. I started working there as a carwash boy at age 9. Two years later, I started driving customers’ cars into the grease bay.

      At age 14, I ran the station until closing time at 10 p.m. I sold tires, batteries and other high-dollar accessories to farmers and negotiated the purchases of supplies for the station.

      There were five children in our family. Everybody had a list of chores. We did not receive an allowance because my parents did not believe in it.

      Every Saturday morning, before anything else, and Wednesday night after dinner, we swept and mopped the kitchen floor. This was a prestige job, because it was the one my dad had when he was a kid.

      Daily, we made our beds, swept our bedrooms, and washed or dried dishes every-other-day. I polished everyone else’s shoes before church on Sunday. We took turns caring for the family pony planting flowers and picking up roadside trash. There seemed to be an endless list of stuff that needed to be done.

      My younger brother and I both selected high-profile sales-oriented jobs as our professions. We both credit our youthful experience at Hurtte’s Texaco as the reason for it.

      Frank E. Hurtte Davenport, Iowa

       www.riverheightsconsulting.com

      Don’t just dream. Set goals and create it

      From the 1980s through my teenage years, my parents owned a bait and tackle store on Long Island. Selling fishing supplies, bait, poles and more, “The Shop” was my second home, from age 5 on. I had regular chores, such as folding up cardboard boxes for worms, putting swivels and fishing accessories into bags, making signs, counting out killies (fish bait), helping with inventory, and more.

      This shaped my work ethic as a child in the following ways.

      1.It clarified how responsibility was a part of everyone’s life, young and old, and made me more accountable and responsible;

      2.It encouraged a feeling of teamwork within my family;

      3.It instilled positive associations between work and personal reward;

      4.It instilled a deep belief in chasing your dreams because owning a fishing shop had been my dad’s long-time dream; and

      5.It showed me that women can defy gender stereotypes. My mom did dirty work beside my father and knew volumes about fishing.

      I am 29, a native New Yorker, and am still helping my dad with his business by building him a new website in my spare time.

      Victoria Witchey Lindenhurst, New York

      Freelance writer--www.combsbaitntackle.com

      New perspective changes the view

      My parents own a small outdoor sporting goods retail store -- Deak’s Fur Company in Staunton, Indiana. While growing up, I and my three younger siblings helped out regularly by taking deposits to the bank, going to the post office, stocking shelves, taking inventory, cleaning, and helping to order merchandise. We received a monthly allowance for our contributions at the store and for helping out at home.

      When I was a pre-teen in the early 1990s, my dad taught me the double-entry accounting system and gave me responsibility for the general ledger. I posted invoices and receipts and balanced the accounts.

      At the time, I hated having the responsibility. I procrastinated and waited until the last day to do my job.

      Looking back, I see how wise it was to have responsibility while growing up.

      Having this job taught me: where money comes from and where it goes; to appreciate the money the store brought to our family; how the business world works; responsibility; self-discipline; and a sense of independence and entrepreneurship.

      I became an entrepreneur. I was always working on a money-making project. For example, when my pet guinea pigs had a litter, I’d sell them to the local pet shop. Today, I’m employed full-time and I moonlight as a marketing consultant. My husband and I own a property management group.

      Susan Conyers Daleville Indiana

       www.susanconyers.com

      Chores build self-discipline

      Doing chores while growing up helped me in two ways.

      The first is simple: I knew how to do chores. I was surprised when I went to college how many classmates didn't know how to do laundry, or how to change a vacuum bag.

      The second is more a function of my parents than a function of chores: I learned how to manage my time. I was often given a deadline on when chores had to be complete. After that deadline, I wasn’t allowed to do anything fun like watching TV, playing games or reading books until my chores were complete.

      I received an allowance unrelated to chores.

      This idea of “work before pleasure” really took hold with me, and I still operate that way today. I can never quite relax unless my dishes are done, for example.

      I've never been a procrastinator, and I think this correlates with my parents’ enforcement of chores.

      Nate Chenenko, contract manager

      Rochester, New York

      New practice: Become aware of your unspoken expectations and non-verbal language towards your children.

      Challenge: Make a list of everything you do around the house. Don’t leave anything out. Ask them to make a similar list with a column of what they do for themselves and a column of what they do for the family. Schedule a family meeting with the goal of moving some of your list onto their