Creative Parenting

Several years ago Jeff's mom took quite a bit of time and put together "The Black Book." She decided that she wanted to write down stories from the kids growing up and that she'd found written on bits of paper that she'd shoved here and there. It's a lot of fun to read and helps me understand a little more about my husband. Okay, so there's this one story that Jeff's mom wrote about him when he was roughly 7 or 8 years old. Here's the beginning:
"Jeff frequently ate his boogers and nothing we did seemed to affect him enough to quit this disgusting habit. I don't remember just how old he was but I do remember that I figured if he was old enough to write in cursive, he was old enough to know better than to eat boogers. Finally, in desperation, I ordered him to write an essay on why he shouldn't eat snot."
I'm sure we all had some disgusting habit when we were kids, I was the kid who always bit my finger nails and chewed with my mouth wide open. I can happily say that this little bit of parenting genius seems to have worked on Jeff - I've never known him to eat his boogers!
Anyway, I think Jeff decided that this different way of handling behavioral problems might work on our kids (mostly because punishing them with extra push-ups is starting to get old). Ian has written two essays since Sunday and has another one that he will be writing today. They've included "Why I should take care of my clothes", "Why doing my homework is important" and "Why reverence during family prayer is important". Emma even gets to get in on the action! Her report (also to be written tonight) is "Why I should have mom check my homework at night INSTEAD of 5 minutes before school". I figure that they'll get the idea soon enough and, hopefully, will start to think before they act like apes.
What are some of your creative parenting ideas?
P.S. Here's Ian's report on homework, spelling mistakes and all (it cracks me up):
"I thinc it is inportint to do your home worek becouse you can get in truble. and you can get a bad grade. and you can be sepended and you can rite a essay for your mom and dad and you can be gounded. and you can not lern enything."