Ironflower requested a meal the other day. Lovebug asked for more apple just now. Hugmonkey is actually eating the food he asks for these days. Things are freaking weird around here.
My kids have always been lackluster eaters. Not only are they picky, they just don't eat a lot. Even of their favorite foods. After initial anxiety caused by our former pediatrician (who felt that, despite Ironflower's health, height, head circumference and achieved developmental milestones, she was unhealthy because she wasn't a fat baby), we have pretty much let the kids be. Sure, we try new foods and make them finish their fruit, but we don't enforce cleaned plates and we give them very small portions.
Hugmonkey is the most enthusiastic eater of all, but according to one parenting article I read his intake has been on the bottom level of normal at best. Mostly it's just that he eats more than the other children.
I'm overexplaining so that you'll understand why I'm so freaked out. My kids keep asking to eat. And eat. And eat. And they're not even asking for junk food all the time. And I'm a wreck. How do parents of good eaters deal with this all the time? It seems like every 5 minutes I'm getting a snack together for someone. Or preparing a meal (I might also be traumatized because Hot Guy is pretty much never home to make dinner anymore, which I know is in breach of our marriage contract and is making the kids a little too familiar with the local pizza place.). Or loading the dishwasher. Or finding rogue bits of food on the floor by the couch.
So I've been toying with the idea of a kind of kid buffet, kind of like the craft services on they have on TV shows and movies with budgets. I'll just put a bunch of healthy and healthy-ish foods out on the table and the kids can just go eat whenever they feel like it. If they are hungry, the food will be right there, much like when they were breastfeeding. And I'll be able to write a post or an article or go to the bathroom without someone whining for food.
I realize that this would cut down on our family meal times, but I also think I'd be a lot happier during those meal times if we didn't have them 3 times a day, plus innumerable snacks. Beside, isn't grazing supposed to be healthier?
I know I read an article about this once. I think it was really about making snacks accessible, but I didn't pay much attention because at the time I had 2 kids under 2 and my goal in life was to make things inaccessible for them. I couldn't imagine having children who could open a drawer and not make a huge mess. Actually, I still can't. Even Hot Guy messes up my attempts at refrigerator organization* on a daily basis.
Maybe it should be the kids and husband buffet.
*Yes, I would keep my fridge organized if I could. And the snack drawer. And the bread box. I actually used to be known for being organized professionally and for having a clean house. You know why things were organized and clean? Because I never let anyone mess it up, that's why. And then I had kids.
With the buffet system, no one will go into the kitchen and dump the cracker box upside down so that only half of the crumbs wind up on the plate. No one will let the grapes get squished under the juice boxes. No one will demand this or that for lunch - the only choices will already be on the table. No one will get interrupted 3 separate times in the space of 8 minutes!
I am so trying my super new genius parenting idea Tuesday.
7 comments:
I think it sounds like a great idea.
Around our house so many of us have to eat differnt things that we very rarely have just "one" meal.
Sounds like a stress free meal time.
Great idea. I'm also mom to a pathetic eater and I also sometimes think it would be really annoying to have a kid who WANTED to eat all the time!
@KittyCat - I want to learn how to do one dinner with several versions, but first I have to learn how to really cook.
@Katy It is! I had no idea.
My daughter is picky too. There ar eprobably only ten thing stht I know she'll eat. All of a sudden she's asking for hamburgers and eating brocolli. It blows my mind. I'm just wondering when she'll go back to her old ways.
@Am I Really Grown Up - If my kids ate any vegetables I would probably assume they were ill! Maybe your daughter's growing out of the picking eater phase?
After having a doctor freak out that my older daughter's head wasn't big enough (we have small heads, I still wear child sized hats) and then another doctor freak out that my premature son's plates weren't moving back into position as fast as he thought they should, and then having things sent home with my oldest son that he was underweight (despite eating everything, all the time) I've kind of stopped listening.
I know when something is wrong with my kids. But a few of my kids are peanuts, and just aren't big. A couple are. I've had fat babies and thin babies, and just take each one for who and what they are.
I will say, in our house, we've also given up on being the food police. We feed them, they eat what they want, and then they get fed again at snack or meal time. I just don't have the patience or energy to be a short order cook for six kids. lol
I have sort of tried a buffet system with my older kids in the past, filling snack drawers with healthy snacks and letting them eat as they wished. Only problem was they'd gorge and then be mad when there weren't more. I started rationing again.
Good luck!
@Veronica - Thanks for coming by!
@Muse Mama - What great advice! We sort of tried that, but they were so picky we got into the habit of taking requests and force feeding a few healthy foods. Now it's too complicated.
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