to want to scream if one more mother looks me at in horror when I give my kids sweets at the school gates?

[londoner20]

aarrghhh. The looks I get when I take sweets to the school gates! My children get a healthy lunch - tuna, strawberries, apple, wholemeal bread, fresh orange juice. I turn up at the gate to collect them with say, a packet of crisps, or horror of horrors, a sweet and the LOOKS I get you'd think I was giving them alcohol or worse. (and if I dare go to the sweet shop on a Friday for a treat ....) What's wrong with everyone!! If you forbid something you are making it appealing... surely? what does everyone else think?

Never seen anyone giving out snacks at hometime - maybe it is a small village thing - no one has very far to go to get home, so no need to have it at the gate? DS sometimes raids his lunchbox for leftovers when we are at the park (on the way home), and sometimes I raid it for 2yo ds2.
DS has been round to play with a few new friends recently and has had quite substantial snacks, whereas at home he has nothing (other than his lunchbox remains if he want's them or a fairy cake if ds2 & grandma have bene baking) until tea time at around 5.30pm - never occured to me to offer anything and he doesn't ask.

I take a juice and some mango fingers.
About twice a week we go to the sweetshop for a chocolate treat
Crisps- very rarely. Do you know how much salt there is in them?

I take a juice and some mango fingers.
About twice a week we go to the sweetshop for a chocolate treat
Crisps- very rarely. Do you know how much salt there is in them?

Go and pick them up tomorrow and hand them a lump of lard each, then see everyones faces!

OR, even a fruit shoot!

aaaah., no, not a fruit shoot .,that is surely a social services offence

ds takes his lunchtime drink in a (much used) fruit shoot bottle, or he did until he today - when he didn't bring it home! Grr.

I don't see what the problem is.

If the looks you're getting are bothering you, all you have to do is take a few steps away from the school gates before producing the snack.

If you're determined to feed your children in front of everyone else, then you need to develop a thicker skin. If they're annoyed, they're annoyed. Not much you can do about it, surely?

Am I missing something important here?

I wouldn't care about the looks myself, but I find it odd that people would be annoyed at what you feeding your children. What a strange world it has become.

as long as you don't mond taking them to the dentist when they get holes in their teeth

I don't think there is anything wrong in giving a snack (healthy or otherwise), especially if it means the difference between a grumpy hungry child and a happy one. I often pick up my dd from nursery with a box of raisins or a handful of smarties

But they're not annoyed at what the OP is feeding her children (I don't think) - that certainly would be odd. I think they're just less than enthralled at having to have a long conversation about "why is X eating sweets when I only have boring old fruit".

Not a disaster obviously, but a tiring conversation, even more so if easily avoidable.

welliemum .. no, you're not missing anything ... the discussion isn't about what you feed your kids but the 2 mins difference between giving them something at school gates, when surrounded by friends, or giving them something a couple of minutes down the road when on way home

it's very odd isn't it?

Message withdrawn

You need to develop Telfon skin I think if it bothers you what they think.

Mine have an ice-cream from the van outside school at least once a week. And we sometimes pop to the newsagents for chocolate or go to the bakers for cakes. And yes, mine usually eat their dinner - DS#1 could usually eat 2 meals if I'm honest.

if it's about not ruining their appetite though ... I blardy wish .. mine can eat a chocolate muffin and a sandwich and still be starving at 5pm

No. Not entirely. But it's the one thing (as well as if they ever started to get fat) that would/does make me hold back on the extras.

at the icecream van outside the school....

But it's a damned good way of teaching children the meaning of the word no ! Funnily mine may or may not ask for one, but when I say no they are OK with that.

I personally wait until we get home before they have their afternoon snack. However, couldn't care less what other parents do with their kids - it really isn't any of my business. By the time kids have started school they are old enough to understand the concept of NO.

All my children get nothing until we get home.
a) because if they eat and walk it takes them ages.
b) higher risk of them choking on something.
c) what they get depends on how much lunch is left and what If all lunch is eaten then they get a treat. If not then they have to eat leftover from lunch (healthy snack only).
All the children sit down on the floor together with snacks and juice when we get home.

Theres always an ice cream van outside my lodal infant school. It always has a huge queue..........in a very "eductated" area.

One of the other primaries in this area is located very close to two secondary schools. Consequently, the ice cream van is always parked outside that school rather than near ours. Shame really, cos I'd often like an icecream whilst waiting for DS3. Wouldn't buy one for DS3 in case it upset the other kids, obviously.