THE SAL'S: OUR VERSION OF THE SIMS

Recently I've had extreme insomnia. This morning was the most I've had. I awoke at about 2:45AM, and it's now 8AM, and I still cannot go back to sleep!
I know that a lot of it has to do with the fact that I am 38 weeks and 3 days pregnant... only 11 days till the due date! Woo-Hoo!!! But I have also been doing a lot of thinking on many different levels, and this morning my thoughts led me to this awesome idea that I cannot wait to share with the kids!
When I had the idea first, I was thinking of it as an experiment in "real life" for the kids. That got me to thinking.. what did I mean "real life"??? That's really an insult to my children's lives they are leading right now! I mean, what? do they live fake lives right now? No!
So, I changed the name of my idea to Simulated Adult Living. The idea came to me when I thought about how I'd be explaining something to my kids. I was posing a conversation in my head (come on, you know you do it all the time too!) with them about how things like bedtimes work differently when you live in a house with 7 other people, versus if you were deciding a bedtime just for you. I was thinking about how we'd discuss group dynamics versus single dynamics of life. And then how they might think that living alone might be more fun than with 7 other people because you could choose your own bedtime without considering the fact that your little brothers who need more sleep than you would be kept up by the light you are using to draw or read by. And how if you are the 5 year old, for mom and dad's sake of needing energy to go to work and take care of the baby, you need to go to bed at a decent hour so as not to worry them at night about what you are doing, or having to deal with your extra irritability from lack of sleep the next day. Not to mention the health benefits of getting the appropriate amount of sleep for you body.
I thought, wouldn't it be cool to give them the opportunity to experience living alone, if they so chose? They would then see all the fun, comraderie, and companionship, etc.,etc. that would be lacking, and be able to weigh that in their own head vs. the "freedoms" that come with making choices for just one person. Not to mention the pure fun of the experience for them!
But how could I do that?
Well, we could start with having them set up a "household" for themselves in a designated set apart from the rest of the house area, such as the current playroom (soon to be Jesse's room), or the basement. They could stay in that area for as long as they wanted, and come out to socialize for intervals of time... but only as closely related to adult life as possible. Meaning that they would have to have the responsibilities of an adult as well. They could experience for themselves the freedoms vs. responsibilities, and the actions vs. consequences in soooo many areas!
My idea began evolving. I think it was at this point that I realized it'd be sort of like the game "The Sims" which the kids love playing. (Consequently, after doing some research into some of the games options, we chose to take it back because of the access to "more mature" content.)
But since they loved setting up their own adult lives on game, I'm figuring that they'd love to do it in real life as well! We could set up an entire economy just for them! They would do jobs around the house for me, for which I would "pay" them with SAL money. We would research how much a person would get paid for that particular job in the adult world. Then we would keep an account, and they could rent a living space, arrange it how they want, purchase items for their "apartment" such as a bed, TV, decor, etc, etc.. They would also get to research pricing and purchase such items as toiletries, food, entertainment (movies/video games), etc... I haven't thought this totally through yet, because I want to introduce the idea to them and have them help brainstorm with me.
I think it would be a ton of fun, so I really hope they are as into it as I am! I'll keep the blog updated!