Sometimes I think I'm being a "mean" spirited mom but I don't understand the prize culture that's happening. Who started this and why did everyone follow??? 

When my son played little league baseball he was on a pretty good team that almost made it to the championship round, but got eliminated. We were bummed, but so proud of our team. One of the moms felt we should all chip in money and buy all the players trophies. She literally said her son would be devastated if he didn't get a trophy. I said, "I will not fork out the dough and if I know my son, he could care less about a trophy that was just given to him versus a trophy that was won/earned. And what does that say to the 2 teams who made it to the championship round?" Side note: we were talking about 11-year-old boys, not 4-5-year-old t-ballers. Our coaches felt the same way I did and voted against it. Instead we planned a barbeque party to celebrate our awesome year, but no trophies. 

Guess what??? That mom ordered the trophies anyway and brought them to the party!!! I was in shock! My son received his trophy, handed it to me, and never looked at it again. But if that trophy was from the hard earned championship game, he would have probably slept with it.

Flea