Thank you all for entering. This giveaway is now closed. The winner was Paula.

When you are trying to get your budget under control and cutback on your expenses, many people are willing to make personal sacrifices. However, when it comes to making cutbacks that effect our children many people have a much harder time.

My parents did a great job raising me to be an entitlement-free child. It is one of the best gifts they ever could have given me, and something I am truly grateful for. It helped me to be the responsible person I am today. It helped me to be grateful and satisfied with the things that I have instead of being in constant pursuit of the latest and greatest.

I have done my best to do the same with my children but I think it is harder than ever to do so. It is really hard to be the only parent that isn’t spending hundreds of dollars on your child’s birthday party or giving your child fancy new gadgets. Bring on the mommy-guilt.

This book first tells you how to get over that guilt. It helps you to see that giving your child everything that they want, you are not making them happy and making them feel secure. In fact by giving in to everything that your child wants and meeting all of his/her demands you are doing the opposite of what you intend. From the book:

“Without age-appropriate skills for handling difficult emotions, the entitlement child lives in fear. She isn’t sure that others can and will help her if she has a problem…Imagine a child who can make adults jump through hoops in desperation or push adults into an emotional frenzy. That’s outright scary for a little person who’s counting on others to be her anchor in a storm”

Next the book outlines what an entitlement-free child is and what entitlement-free parenting looks like. There is plenty of reassurance that this is going to take time and that every child is different. This is not one size fits all help.

The bulk of the book is practical strategies to use in every day parenting situations. It covers just about every possible situation: hitting, bickering with siblings, eating out, classroom issues, allowance and cell phones to name a few.

I know this is a longer review than I usually do, but as I said above, if you have a child with entitlement issues, it can really hurt your family’s finances. I really feel like this is an important book and is really helpful.

The Entitlement-Free Child, Raising Confident and Responsible Kids in a “Me, Mine, Now!” Culture is available from Amazon for $11.69, but thank you to BSM Media, I have one copy to give away to one lucky reader.

To enter to win, leave a comment here telling me what your biggest parenting dilemma is. I will choose one random winner on Friday, October 16th at 1:00 PST.