Game time.

The boy is in the playroom with the neighbor boy. It's a good thing. For quite a while the neighbors were quite uninterested in playing. The excuses and lies broke my heart, but I just kept my mouth shut for the most part. I didn't actually know if it was the kids or the older teenage sister who was making things up. At this point I'm just happy that he has someone to play with for a while.
At Christmas we got the boy a gamecube. He asked for a couple games for it and we got him one of them. I also bought a collection off the bargain table at the department store. Turns out the game he asked for was too hard for him to make much headway on. Thank goodness I got the other game or he never would have played the thing.
Then hubs rented some games on the first long weekend after New Years. He found several he likes very much. After that the boy took his wallet and went to buy one only to discover they were all more money than he had. (My fault because I made him put his Christmas cash in the bank.) I decided to offer to buy a game for every 25 extra chore points.
See we have a chore list he gets a check for each item, there's a minimum number and over that it's bonus time. Previously he would get cards (Yugioh, Pokemon etc) for his bonus. Under the new program we count the extra chores toward games. Today he cashed in his first 25 extra chores for a new game.
It took him about 5 weeks to get one and the concept is working really well. He is a very willing helper and has taken on several extra chores to boost his bonuses. I not only don't have to nag for chores he was actually very upset when I set the table while he was ill.
The other interesting plus is that the new game makes this a more interesting destination for the neighbor boy. Neighbor has come over on the weekends we had rentals, but today it was for the new game. It's an interesting dynamic, but it's all good.