My kids sure haven't suffered from material things, when I was in the business world and traveling 15-22 days a month I spoiled them with material **** because I wasn't home. Thank goodness I finally woke ip and realized family is more important than money. Regardless if you believe in church, the principle the teach there are good traits to have. I've took mine, as often as possible. My wife has been very supportive in that we decided to limit them to no more than two hours a week on video games from day one. We monitored it very closely, now days we don't even have to keep track it became a habit that they follow themselves. I've always let my kids try whatever they feel like their big enough to do (with supervision). My oldest wanted to weld we he was about 10, we got some flat scrap, some granny 7014 rod and bought and extra helmet and I taught him how to do it safely and he's become quite the fabricator. A lot of it has to do with trusting your kid, letting them do the fun stuff, not just the mundane crap. Luckily I live in a very rural area on a farm, shoot they've all been driving since they could see over the dash and touch the pedals ( on the farm). Too many people won't let the kids do anything for fear of being hurt, luckily I had parents that let me spread my wings.
All the youngster's aren't too bad, think of all the young people serving in the military, the best and brightest military we've ever had imho, much better than when I first went in the service over 30 years ago.
Hedge it sure looks like you have your son on the right track, you have to involve them in everything you can. As soon as it cools off, I'm taking mine down to where I grew up in Mac County to fish for small mouth for a few days, camping out on the creek. I grew up on a mile of creek frontage, I'm gonna show them the ole man still has it when it comes to catching the big ones, got a few tricks up the sleeve.