Should I have fed this child?

[yogahippo]

DD is in year 6. We moved recently and she's having to try and make friends in a new school. She has a phone and last night was texting a girl and they arranged a play date after school at our house. I messaged mum to check it was ok.

They arrived home, had snacks, played happily. Mum picked up at 6.25. She asked what they'd had for dinner and seemed most put ours when I said they hadn't had dinner. Thing is we usually only eat around 7.25-7.30 so I didn't think to cook dinner. It wasn't mentioned in the messages.

Im not originally from the UK. Have I made a mistake? DD says lots of her friends have younger siblings so eat quite early compared to us...

@yogahippo the books things made me laugh!!!! Although I imagine it being so ver horrific at the time.

I am an expat and would definitely choose to be friends with you!

All the people on here saying they have dinner at 5pm - I'm curious to know how this fits in with work? I work til 6pm at the earliest and my husband works til 6:30 & often isn't home til gone 7pm so we eat as a family (inc a toddler) at as close to 7pm as we can.

I'm also not from the UK, so see your side OP. Wouldn't expect child to have been fed dinner by only 6:30pm. I only finish work for 6pm (standard office finishing hours) then commuting and pick up from afterschool sports etc, so dinner is usually between 7-8pm for a 12 year old, depending on what is cooked. If they have a later training or game, could be 9pm.

Perhaps this early time is only normal for those with a stay at home parent or someone who leaves work quite early in the day. At any rate, the friend's parent is rude for assuming their child would be fed a full meal, the snacks you served sound very substantial too.

First of all welcome! 👋

You haven’t done anything wrong. Everyone’s routines/schedules are different.

Don’t give it a second thought. If they were hungry kids are very quick to let you know. 🙂

DD is year 6. We usually eat at around 7pm, but if she's having a playdate, I feed them earlier. DD is the youngest of my children. When Ds1 was year 6, the children would have eaten at 5.30-6 at the latest and yes, I would have been annoyed they hadn't been fed.

I always cook early if it’s a play date so that they have been properly fed.
If I was collecting my child at 6.30 I would assume they’d been fed.
However, if they hadn’t it’s not a big issue and she was unreasonable to show that she was put out by it, her behaviour is not ok.

I wouldn’t have expected my child to be fed. People eat at different times and especially at 11yo. We don’t eat until 7/7:30 and my children are younger.

I wouldn’t care what the mother said or how they came across. It’s our responsibility to feed or make sure our own children are fed and if she was concerned then she should have arranged it before hand. Tough luck for her as I see it. It’s not like you’ve given them nothing, they had snacks.

Id assume you would give her dinner yes, whenever we had friends over we always gave them tea at about 5pm, then we ate later

Yeh I would have fed her and would have expected my child to have been fed. Although I wouldn't have been bothered it would have been fine and I definitely wouldn't have made it known that I expected it!

I think there's an element of overthinking this, but if I was dropping a child off for a playdate, I could conceivably enquire if the child would be fed, but , were I to forget, when picking up said child I would ask if the child had been fed and

a) if the answer was yes, I would not have fed said child
b) if the answer was no, I would have fed said child

No-one needs to exit the pram about this, and there is no compulsion or expectation to feed a child unless you yourselves are eating when the child is still there.

@underneaththeash @velvet24

Seems strange logic to eat later yourself but assume on playdates, dinner must be earlier.

@linsey2581

Ok so 1. It’s called tea time not dinner time (dinner is a lunch time). And 2. Who the heck has their meal at that time of the day?? My tea time is around 5-6pm

See, I’m in London and the only people I know who would ever have their dinner that early are shift workers (I think calling the evening meal ‘tea’ is a Northern thing, definitely not a Southern thing!) Normal commute is AT LEAST 60 minutes each way, because London, so if finishing work at 5pm that means getting to after school club just in time to collect before the 6.30 cut off, home at about 6.30, so if start cooking straight away can have dinner ready for 7pm. People just adapt their routines according to what they’re dealing with. Sounds like you start work early / finish early and have a short commute. Not everyone does!

I have just glanced back at this thread.
OVER 300 RESPONSES. 😃😃

I'm happy- honestly it looks like native British people can't agree on a meal time or feeding children so I feel I've been let off the expat hook.

I have however been heavily judged by a few posters whining won't tag for the quality/ quantity/ sugar content/ very existence of the snacks I served. This stings. Can I point out we're all perfectly healthy and these snacks are nothing unusual.

Cinnamon bun thingy. Pic attached. "Bite size" !!! Seriously I wouldn't recommend ever getting these as it's a slippery slope to addiction. We're now a 3 bag per week household but in fairness the boys are dustbins. (Try microwaved for 10 seconds accompanying a mid morning coffee....) However DD and her friend only had a couple.

Here's the recipe for my Polish Grandmas's apple pancakes that DD and her friend made.

150g self-raising flour
Pinch bicarbonate of soda
1 eggs
150 ml milk. (Or half and half milk and buttermilk or milk and plain yogurt. Whatever).
1 sweet apple grated.
Pinch salt. Pinch sugar.

Mix and fry in a bit of butter. Yum.

They seemed fine !

Cinnamon buns thingy
"Whining won't tag" should have been "judging me".
I quite like whining though.

@Hmm1234

You should of offered food especially after a long school day. 7:30 is late for dinner and not very kind it’s a play date to be so tight

The OP did offer quite a bit of food, which they ate. Nothing tight about it.

Sounds lovely, OP. And great that your 11-year-old and friend cooked as well.

Oh my goodness I want to be friends with you and you sound like an absolutely brilliant mother! 😀
If that had been my child, I would have been very grateful that they had enjoyed themselves and had delicious sounding snacks. Hopefully, as others have said, at secondary school, it will be more normal for kids to sort themselves out.

The friend's mother was very rude. Unacceptable.

LOOOOL at last a voice of sanity !! Honestly these parents are being so over the top and pretty rude to the op - she gave her a snack !!! She didn’t know !!! She eats later!! She’s from another country !

You definitely should have fed her

My 7 week old has just started using a dummy which is amazing for settling her during her very fuzzy period in the evening.
It does seem though that she is feeding less since starting with the dummy (2 days now)
She also seem to struggle a little latching on the boob.
I’d there any advise out there?
Does anyone else have this same problem?
We will have to stop using it if it will affect her feeds.

Op you did nothing wrong especially as there were generous snacks
Friend’s dm was presumptuous
That said, it would be normal in this situation for the child to be offered dinner.
Don’t worry about it too much but next time I would just make clear to the parent that although there will be snacks in your house you don’t do dinner until later on. If you’re not English I would imagine most parents to be understanding

Don't beat yourself up about this and don't let some of these comments get to you. I think the child's mother was a bit anal with her reaction but it can be a minefield navigating early school years. I'm sure you won't make the same mistake twice.

Maybe message and say you eat later and didn’t think about tea but will next time.

We eat 430/5 but they are 3 and 5 :)