Four Bottles and a Bracelet

The doorbell rang.

I peeked through the spyhole. Nothing. Only the sound of giggles and chatter outside. When I opened the door, five girls stood there, maybe between six and eleven, holding boxes filled with jewelry. Their pitch was simple and disarming:

“Would you like to buy some jewelry?
If you don’t have cash, we also accept bottles.”

That line alone was worth a few euros.

They didn’t need to explain how it worked. In the Netherlands, everyone knows bottles can be traded for statiegeld: deposit money at the supermarket. A tiny glimpse of a circular economy, run on innocence and imagination.

I told them I didn’t have cash but did have bottles. “How many for a bracelet?” I asked. They huddled together like a miniature boardroom. “Ten?” one guessed. When I said I didn’t have ten, they quickly recalculated: “Then one!”

Their negotiation skills still needed work, but their spirit was gold. I offered them four bottles, and my seven-year-old daughter got to pick her prize. It wasn’t fine jewelry, but it wasn’t junk either. Wooden beads, a hint of bronze, honest effort.

As I drove off later, I spotted them again in another street, boxes in hand, walking like little merchants. Synchronicity, I thought, or maybe just smart sales strategy.

Family Meeting 101

Tonight we’ll have our first official family meeting, not a birthday or holiday dinner but an actual sit-down with an agenda. Three themes: Happiness, Health, and Help. We’ll apply them to every corner of life, including finances. Are we financially happy? Healthy? Do we need help?

It’s simple, but it’s structure — a way to talk, to listen, to stay aligned. And maybe that’s what I saw in those girls too: structure disguised as play. A first spark of entrepreneurship, learning how to ask, how to offer, how to create value together.

We’ll also discuss Christmas plans and how to start using AI tools — voice notes, dictation, maybe even a touch of co-writing. It’s not about replacing connection with technology, but learning to live with it. To teach our kids to trade not just bottles for bracelets, but ideas for insight.

I keep thinking about those five girls at the door. No cash, no website, no marketing plan. Just courage, curiosity, and a box of beads. Maybe that’s how every new economy begins, not with a currency but with a question:

What are we truly willing to trade
for the world we want to create?