To think your child doesn't need a snack in a 30-minute toddler class?

[Mummyreindeerlegz]

Sorry for the long title.

Why is it some parents give their one year old snacks during really short classes (or at all during classes!)? A one year old wandering around with a soggy rice cake, dropping bits is grim. Wait half an hour or give them a snack before you come.

Please tell me why people think this is ok? Fully prepared to be told I am being unreasonable.

I give my DD snacks regularly and if that happens part way through a half hour toddler group, so be it. She is incredibly underweight due to allergies and if she has any more losses, she is getting admitted to hospital to be tube fed. I need calories in, and I couldn't care less if some other people find it 'grim'. I appreciate what you're saying regarding it being dangerous for your child, I have the same issue, we were at a group this morning where there was angel delight. If she had got near it, we would have ended up back in hospital - I made sure we didn't get near it. Problem solved.

Snacks have been around since toddlers have been toddlers.

Well, no. Not really true. Toddlers have been around since humans were ambulatroy on two legs, but I reckon snacking culture for children has only really come in since childrearing stopped being about being "seen but not heard". Children used to be expected to fit in with the adult eating timetable once they were weaned, for the main part. There may have been high tea, or elevenses, but not the constant pacification of tantrummy children with a box of raisins from your handbag that you see nowadays.

I get where your coming from and in this case YANBU however if a child is genuiny hungry I don't think they should be made to wait but I do think they should be encouraged to sit down whilst eating to contain the mess and decrease the risk of choking and of course the parent should be told to clean up, it's rude to leave a mess and expect others to clean it up.

I pacify mine with a box of raisins and now there a bit older occasionally my phone. There. I said it.

And thing I'm most ashamed about in my previous post. I put "there" instead of "they're"

@rayoffuckingsunshine I'm sorry to hear of your children's issues and I hope she remains well.

Blimey my typing is terrible today!

Up Your original there was correct as far as I can tell!

No it should have been they're. As in they are a bit older.

I have noticed I am often the only one not proffering snacks constantly to my children - they are 3.5 and 1. People often looks pityingly at us and try and give us snacks. I keep snacks in my bag but don't get them unless needed.

I do actually give snacks, 1 between each meal but so they eat the meals they are small. It's the grazing that would make them not hungry for dinner.

I wouldn't care but I put effort into healthy meals and snacks are often not so good. Of course if someone is obviously starving I might give extra.

Generally at an activity they are too busy enjoying it to want a snack until they see everyone else has one.

I was looking at your second there. Muppetry at work.

Don't you feel that sometimes some parents do the things that they do to show off to their other parents? Like "look at my good baby eat his rice snack , so good with his food, not fussy at all" knowing that there are probably some parents there who would see their child eating the snack and worrying why their child doesn't do the same.
Or they do it because they feel that if they don't do it and other parents are, they will be judged?

I genuinely do think that this is what some parents do, particularly as you say when the child is not crying or demanding a snack

YANBU, I was the only mum at some groups that never took snacks, the same with shopping. We were barely out the house more than two hours, my child wasn't going to starve in that time. I think it's partly a generational thing ( not a popular opinion on MN when the average MN is probably 15/20 younger than me).
I kept an "emergency" carton of apple juice in the glove box of my car, that was about it (one sat there for six months).
That said, none of my business what other mums do but even on a 20 minute walk home from school I had a friend who would pack a lunch box of stuff for her 7 year olds (DD was forced to wait until we got home, I think she felt a bit left out 😳).

Is this even an issue? Really?

It's ok I wrote children's instead of child's. Maybe we should all have a snack to help our typing / spelling / grammar?

If they need a snack, fine. It's the wandering around with it making a mess everywhere that does my nut in. And as you say, other kids picking up the soggy remains and trying to eat them. Pop your little one in the pushchair or on your lap to eat and don't let them walk around with it. Often the mess just gets left for whichever poor sod is running the group to clean up! I've even seen kids walking round with yogurt, dripping it all over the floor at Playgroups before now.

I accept that I'm lucky that my DS doesn't tend to tantrum out of the house. When he tantrums in the house, I just ignore him, and he stops pretty quickly. He's pretty calm and happy most of the time. I don't put this down to my excellent parenting, I put it down to luck (and payback because he was such a difficult baby). So mostly I don;t judge any parent getting by however they can. But I do think the endless availablity of snacks, especially too near to a meal, and the normalisation of the viewpoint that no-one should ever have to suffer a moment's hunger, even when dinner or lunch is on the horizon, is a contributory factor in the obesity epidemic we're seeing in the UK.

I'm with you OP! It's always driven me mad to see my friends walking round with bags full of bloody crackers and shite. My DC always eye them up and look at me as though I'm a shit parent!

If we're out at a mealtime then I either pack a complete lunch or eat at a cafe!

Some parents continue to pack snacks when their kids are tweens!

I imagine them cracking open the bloody rice cakes when their kids are in their thirties! "Here darling...have a snacky" to some big hulking man!

Kids won't pass out or come to harm for not eating for an hour or two!

This parent has probably got into a habit of pacifying their child with food. As snacks go, a rice cake is fairly inoffensive and non messy.

There's not much point in getting riled by it and if your child has allergies you just have to make sure they're not rugby tackling this toddler for their snack.

Also try not to be inadvertently staring daggers at rice cake mum. She might feel a bit unwelcome in the class.

Super...I don't think a child eating a rice cake is anything to show off about is it?

It's the wandering around with food that used to drive me crazy. I always told my dc that if they were eating they were to sit down and eat. When they had finished/full they could get up and play.

That in itself often meant they went and carried on with the activity rather than sit down and eat a snack.

So yanbu in my opinion as the child should be sat down if eating.

It's healthy for most children to be a bit hungry sometimes and to know that they can wait for a while. And to learn to wait without wingeing. (Yes, of course I know about children with particular needs, I work with them).

Parents need to be firm, reinforce the "no, not at the moment" and avoid making a mess in other people's houses or premises. I completely agree with Starling, all this snacking is contributing to the obesity crisis. If a parent wants to take their child to a class, they should respect that class's activities and not treat it as a picnic opportunity.

We have a 9am sports activity once a week. DD(2) will not eat breakfast before we have to leave despite massive persuasion (She usually has breakfast at nursery around 8:30 when she's ready). Without fail, ten minutes in to the class she is hungry and starting to meltdown. I do find it a bit of a nightmare but can't be helped, so we tend to take a tub with little cheese and pineapple cubes or something not too messy.
When she was younger she would never eat proper meals and always wanted to graze so I often had a similar problem with the timings of baby groups. Children centre groups often provided snacks or facilities to make them which made life a bit easier.
I agree that parents need to make sure they clean up the trail of dribbly food though!

User - the emphasis of my point wasn't really on the rice cake itself, it was that some parents try to prove a point that they have a great child who is a good little healthy eater and eats his snacks and plays at the same time which of course must be down to their "fantastic" parenting skills

Or perhaps not let them make the trail of dribbly mess in the first place?!