Do your kids have to ask for food?

[Feijoa Mum]

Growing up with a solo Mum and four of us kids money was almost non existent and Mum budgeted and stretched everything. She did really well this isnt anything against her but I hated it!
I hated having to ask for a crappy superwine biscuit and usually being told no because they were for school lunches. I hated not being able to go to the fridge if I felt like something because I would get in trouble for eating something that was earmarked for tommorrows lunch. I hated having friends over knowing that our after school snack was pretty pitiful if at all. I know its very silly now, but it stuck with me.

So (up until now) my kids pretty much help themselves. Within reason of course there are still rules - kitchen closes at 4pm after school or they wont eat dinner, you guts it and its gone and I wont be buying it again, two biscuits is suffice for a snack. Lunch stuff is out of bounds but generally if your hungry go find something.

Yesterday I bought $40 worth of fruit with the thinking that school is back next week we will need it for lunches. I got 10 bananas, huge bag of grapes, 15 nectarines, half a watermelon, bag of apples and some pears too.
I had one of the nectarines last night then went to give DD one for morning tea this morning and they are all gone! WHAT?? hmmmmm I went to give her a banana - there are two left! Half the bag of grapes is gone as is half the apples. WTF!

The lazy little sods cant be bothered making themselves something to eat so are grabbing the easiest thing that is clearly not filling them up and have eaten the best part of $20 worth of fruit in 24hrs! That is just ridiculous, I dont want to turn into the food police or start hiding food (Mum did this too when we were a little older and started to sneak it) but I cant afford to feed them like this and I dont want my kids to start sneaking food.

So how does it work in your house?

[kelebek]

Having grown up in a similar house I can understand but there is no reason why you can't limit their fruit intake to only 1/2 pieces a day and then they have to find something else?

[xXHopeXx]

Could it be possible to have a bowl/plate of food they are "allowed" to eat in the fridge, and once its all gone/dont like it, then that's it?

Not to "police" it, but just restrict it so they aren't taking tonnes of food, perhaps you could make a couple sandwiches before you get them from school (if they are at school?) and have them cut up in the fridge along with some fruit and biscuits?


Sent from the mobile world of iPhones - while no doubt i should be elsewhere!

[Cherished]

I like xHope's idea of having a bowl of food that they can eat and to limit the fruit intake too. I know dh said that as a kid he would eat all the fruit by himself! TO this day salad and fruit are his favourite foods and it's expensive sometimes! His mum used to get pretty mad with him about it I think. I could eat whatever I wanted growing up including all the lollies/chocolates/chips and really healthy food too of course. We were well off so it wasn't a problem and I think being allowed treats kind of helped me to go the other way iykwim? Because I was allowed them I didn't always 'want' them. ds will probably be allowed whatever he wants too. We don't have bad food in the house so anything will probably be ok. Plus I think it's good to eat when your hungry rather than being forced at meal times.

[appletree]

We have a food board on our fridge which details what is for each meal including morning and afternoon tea. DD loves it because she helps think of it each week and she has some treats penciled in here and there. If either child wants something in between any of these meals there are allowed an arrow root biscuit and told that the next meal is in x mins and there is nothing more till then. Because it is so planned, its never long before the next meal, so it works fine. At first DD got very whingey while she waited but she got over it fairly quickly. Each meal includes a course of fruit, morning and afternoon tea are primarily fruit, but will also have something like rice cakes, popcorn or a home made muesli bar included so it is pretty filling. It has really helped to ensure i have enough fruit as i always used to run out towards the end of the week!

[jacklicky]

I only have one at the moment but she is allowed to eat whatever fruit she likes. I only limit her intake closer to meals....To me I would rather her eat fruit than other 'crap' so we just put a bowl on the table and she knows she can eat whatever she wants....as long as she doesn't waste it.

As I said there is only her and me that eat fruit (DH is a fruit dodger) so its not too expensive for us at the moment....but I do tell her once its gone its gone and I don't replace it until I'm ready too.....and I make sure all the fruit I bought is eaten before I get more....

[beansbeans!]

We had food police in the house growing up and I hated it.

With the girls, they have to ask for food but thats mainly because of their age more than anything else. But we have the policy that they can eat as much fruit as they like, and we restrict the other stuff. i like the idea of a fruit bowl, but I wouldnt be restricting how much they can have when it comes to the healthy stuff. We as a country/world community have major issues with eating properly and I would be commending your kids on choosing the healthy choice without making them think they should choose a biscuit over an apple.

[Astrolady]

Yes my kids need to ask. The answer is generally yes anyway depending on how close it is to a main meal, but if they don't ask and help themselves then I won't know what they need. I am not one to check cupboards LOL I go from memory.

[~me~]

Yes my kids need to ask. The answer is generally yes anyway depending on how close it is to a main meal, but if they don't ask and help themselves then I won't know what they need. I am not one to check cupboards LOL I go from memory.

Same deal here

[Floweryfields]

Hmmm that's alot of fruit - BUT fantastic that they are scoffing fruit as opposed to some other prepackaged loaded with crap item! But yeah, I'd be making some pretty strict ground rules on the quantity allowed per day.

[myturn]

Yes my kids need to ask. The answer is generally yes anyway depending on how close it is to a main meal, but if they don't ask and help themselves then I won't know what they need. I am not one to check cupboards LOL I go from memory.

same here.... I want to know how often DSD is eating as well, cause then I know if she hasn't been eating enough at her main meal to get her through the day.... fruit is always okay, though even that much fruit is a lot of natural sugar to be eating through....

we always had to ask as kids - until we were teenagers pretty much, and even then if it was something special or different in the fridge we still asked - but I recall going through whole bags of grapes in a day - and even now, some fruit always tastes better the same day!!

[Phteven]

They can help themselves to anything they want. We don't keep any food in the house they can't eat and if they finish it I just go and buy more.

[Trillian]

It depends. Fruit can be eaten whenever and as much as they want. I wont limit fruit, however, I buy a lot of the cheaper fruits (apples, citrus and pears) as these can be left in the fruit bowl on the bench, same with banana's as I was still buying them even when they were expensive and the kids have free reign over that, but the more expensive fruits such as grapes, strawberries, kiwi, melon etc I keep in the fridge and they have to ask for that ust so it doesn't get eaten too quickly. We grow a lot of fruit as well so when its in season they can also have whatever they want, except for apricots as they go right through them LOL. Anything else that is packaged is kept away where they can't get it freely so they have to ask for it. They are limited in the amount of packaged foods they can eat otherwise they would just hook into it and it would be gone very quickly. Yoghurts are OK to eat too without asking. I also bake a lot too so they have a lot of homebaked goods but they have to ask for that just so I know there is still some there. What I found worked really well was making up a big plate of saos with tomato/cheese/vegemite/peanut butter and then having that out for them. Another thing I will always do is make sure they aren't eating out of boredom. If they tell me they are hungry, I'll tell them to have a drink of water and most of the time they aren't really hungry at all.

I really loathe the idea of restricting all the food and I make them ask purely so I know how much they are eating and how much I have left. If we run out of food, I can't just make a 5 minute trip to the corner shop because we live out of town. I don't want to create food issues with them by restricting food and making them ask for absolutely everything and denying them - I grew up in a house similar to yours Feijoa Mum and everything 'good' was kept away and rationed. When I moved out of home and could buy my own food, I made a lot of bad food choices because I didn't have to limit food for me kwim? I don't want my kids to end up doing that, so while I do make them ask, I nearly always say yes unless it is close to meal times.

[peanutter]

anything in the crisper was fair game - it was normally apples, oranges, carrots and celery in there ... and there were other things where we knew we could have a limited quantity of (one snack pack or little bag of chips after school, two icypole tubes, etc) any other fruit or food had to be asked for.

this changed when my brothers had their growth spurts (and by then, I'd make a whole saucepan of spaghetti for us or tons of cheese on toasties when we got home from school ... they'd eat it all plus carrots, oranges etc - and still eat their dinner!!)

but yeah, when we were younger, there were certain things in a certain spot which we could help ourselves to.

[AnyDream]

My kids have to ask but the answer is usually yes. I grew up in a very food-scarce household too, and we usually have more food than we need BUT it hasn't always been that way and there have been recent times when the grocery budget has been limited. There isn't usually an endless supply of treat food here so I do tend to limit that to shared family snacks/meals or when we have guests rather than letting the kid(s) go through it like locusts. But I do try to provide a variety of everyday snack type things so even though my DD will tell you it's an unjust hardship to have a choice of eating a toasted sandwich or a mini pizza or crackers & cheese & snacky bits or one of several types of fruit, it's really not

[Floweryfields]

My kids have to ask but the answer is usually yes. I grew up in a very food-scarce household too, and we usually have more food than we need BUT it hasn't always been that way and there have been recent times when the grocery budget has been limited. There isn't usually an endless supply of treat food here so I do tend to limit that to shared family snacks/meals or when we have guests rather than letting the kid(s) go through it like locusts. But I do try to provide a variety of everyday snack type things so even though my DD will tell you it's an unjust hardship to have a choice of eating a toasted sandwich or a mini pizza or crackers & cheese & snacky bits or one of several types of fruit, it's really not

MD what a cruel mother you are!

[CKJ]

Yes my DD has to ask for food, but that's because she is a type 1 diabetic and she needs insulin to counteract what she consumes. However she does have a supply of "free foods" which she can consume and it won't affect her blood sugar levels.

Of course being a child she does sneak food but she is generally good and just asks.

[~Kim~]

Mine are a bit shorter that yours I'd say (well DS is) but they are allowed anything on the bottom shelf/crispers of the fridge. I only say that because we have to keep most stuff in the fridge. Of a morning I leave DS who's a very early riser a yoghurt and a spoon there too so he can get that. They also have a shelf in the pantry with rice crackers etc they can have.
We only have stuff they are freely allowed to eat and anything contraband that appears is put up where I have to get it....though when you are blessed with amazon children that generally means somewhere I need a chair for lol.

Though...that is a lot of fruit in 24hours.