Saw this on the way out of swimming lessons earlier...

[SleepWarrior]

The front entrance to the leisure centre has a few tables with school-type chairs which are usually being used by children to do homework while their siblings swim.

Today as we were leaving there was a mum serving up steaming spaghetti and meatballs out of a giant glass dish onto proper dinner plates with proper cutlery laid out around the plates. Her two very embarrassed looking children (about 10/11yo) were talking in those cross hissy whispers through gritted teeth "that's enough mum", and she was all "no, no don't be silly, you need more meatballs. Here." while she dished up with proper pasta serving spoons.

Spaghetti and meatballs at the swimming pool! Made my day! I normally hate the faff and palaver of swimming day, but this is a new day and time for me so now I can look forward to seeing if she's there each Monday, and find out what's for dinner

One of our local soft plays has a microwave for heating up baby food. Another local mum takes packs of hot dogs in tupperware and microwaves them for her school age children, she has rolls for them and everything. She also takes drinks, crisps, biscuits, fruit even though it's a only food purchased to be eaten place.

scrappy & tea set - bone china complete with milk jug & sugar bowl

A candelabra would look good. Suggest this.
On second thoughts it might set the fire alarms off. Now that would be super embarrassing for the kids.

note to self: personal specs for motherhood role - ability to embarrass dc (tick)

Did she bring the massive pepper grinder?

My DC would love this, they love meals that are 'that bit extra' they go mad for proper napkins, candles, etc (I feel like Martin Crane a lot of the time 😂)

Shamelessly place marking for next week's update!

Am I the only one who isn’t willing to pile on and mock this woman for the “not done-ness” of serving her children a hot dinner? No I’m not her and if I didn’t change my name so much you could see that I’m not one of those people who regularly whine about how mean everyone is on MN. I’m as bitcht as the next self respecting AIBU-er. I think what I find off-putting here is OP’s completely disingenuous faux admiration when what she’s really doing is calling out another mum for being uncool and asking others to join in. Hmmm I think there’s a word for that...

(Flame away)

We spent years at the pool as mine swam competitively, never saw this though.
I used to bung something in the oven, you could set the cooking time and timer so it would be done as we walked in the door.

TheBhagwan - oh no really hadn't meant to come across like that but I guess it is a fair comment.

It isn't faux admiration though; I am genuinely impressed when people can be ballsy and uncool and just get on with what they want to do (and thought on that basis she probably wouldn't give a damn about a MN thread on the topic of her spaghetti). I'm quite the opposite myself and tend not to get what I want done for a pathetic fear of being stared at or getting things 'wrong' (not cool either, but in a rubbish way rather than like this).

She wasn't doing anything awful (unlike a different swim parent who let their toddler throw milk down the spectator tiered seating AND wee on the floor, then walk off and leave the lot) so yeah, I thought it was all wonderfully weird yet practical and very funny all at the same time.

If it seems disingenuous and bitchy then I'm sorry swimming woman if you're reading!

I'm ashamed of my crap effort now. DD2 gets a donner meat and chips to eat at the pool while DS1 is on his lesson. He then gets a nuggets meal for when DD2 is having her lesson. DD1 manages a pizza before it all so she can make it to Guides in time. All at the pool with me running off to the takeaway a couple of times. I need to up my game and start prepping decent hot meals beforehand. I just need to figure out how to keep three meals heated for the hour and a half of swimming lessons. I'm such a slacker.

Joking aside, do warn her very strongly that she MUST NOT attempt to go into the pool for at least two hours after they've completely finished eating.

Oh, and no bombing or heavy petting either

God it's like the antithesis of our usual threads

Did the kids have pj's on?

Takeaway containers float, FYI. One up her by taking your dinner into the actual pool!

Uck, heavy petting

I don't think it's embarrassing. I'd have used a plastic bowl but other than that I could have done the same and I really don't think my kids would have felt embarrassed. 🤷🏻‍♀️
It's not the mums fault the kids felt embarrassed it's all the weirdos who were staring at the kids. Even if it's a bit 'unusual' it's not exactly newsworthy.

I realise its not newsworthy, hence posting in the 'chat' section of MN!

To answer a couple of questions that I missed: not Leicestershire and the kids were in normal clothes rather than pjs.

Fantastic thread!

I'm quite in awe of her tbh (although poor kids indeed!). I used to take a pack up for my dcs to eat on the way home, it was a 30 min drive minimum. One cold dinner a week didn't kill them.

Can you get a sneaky photo next week, op?

I'm guessing shepherds pie

Perhaps these kids do another activity afterwards. Mine used to swim with brownies straight after and not get in until 8pm. They had a pack up tea at the pool too. Not with plates and cutlery though .

People are asking for a photo ?? Jesus wept.

OP I appreciate your honestly. The thread did come across that way to me but clearly you’ve got the crowd’s approval. You seem reasonable so I assume you wouldn’t consider posting a photo of this woman and her children on a public chat site.

Also I live in London so perhaps I’m used to seeing more diversity in terms of how people live their lives. There’s not necessarily a “done thing” in many cases. Obviously sometimes there is and TBH I guess I mostly conform as well, but it doesn’t tend to extend to minute details like how someone gives their kids dinner at swim lessons. In your shoes I may have had a brief thought that it was unusual but definitely not enough to think about beyond a brief moment as I walked by. I’m not above texting a friend if I see something bizarre but this wouldn’t make the cut.

I'm currently in hospital waiting to go down to theatre and I've just come across this thread. I'm absolutely roaring at the comments.

I always take my youngest pasta of some sort in a thermal flask for him to eat whilst his brother swims. Keeps him happy and quiet and he gets dinner at dinner time

Ohh that's tempting. I've spent years trying to work out food in flasks and putting the oven timer on for the minute we get home. I've been that parent with kids in towelling hoodies eating pasta watching their siblings swim because there have been days where we've gone straight from school to the pool and then they've all had consecutive lessons and then onto Guides/football whatever and if they hadn't eaten there then they'd not get fed. There is a cafe but it's shit, slow and expensive.

However - not proper plates and cutlery

I do hot thermos of pasta, or hot dogs, or chunky soup and bread, chilli and bread. A box of crudités, a cookie to finish.

I don’t do plates though. All finger foods.

I didn’t read most of the replies or the OP as being sneering. It’s more admiration isn’t it? And amusement at how different people are rather than narrow mindedness. A bit like when you rock up to the park picnic area with your squashed cheese sandwich and juice box and the table next to you are drinking champagne out of saucers and barbecuing tiger prawns. It’s funny because it’s not usually done but that doesn’t mean people think there’s anything wrong. If they are like me they are envious!

As a child I was always embarrassed that my parents would take a chopping board, knife, corkscrew, tablecloth etc to the beach for our picnics - I would have much rather had a few chips from the snack bar - but now I would love it. Preteens/teens often see any deviation from the norm as embarrassing and I think that’s what most posters are referring to.