It is dd's first day at school tomorrow and dh is inexplicably uninterested in discussing the contents of her lunch box at length with me

[YunoYurbubson]

He says he used all his reserves of feigning interest when I did a shopping chanel style presentation of her new lunch box, the tupperware boxes that fit in it, the cool pack, her backpack and the co-ordinating water bottle.

So I shall have to bore you chat to you about it instead.

G'wan, humour me, I'm excited about my girl's first day at school!

She needs to have a snack and lunch.

She has a banana and some breadsticks with dip for snack.

For lunch she has a cheese sandwich, a box of cut up apple, some carrots and cucumber and a piece of grilled halloumi.

Then she has a bottle of water and a carton of juice.

Shall I pop a cereal bar or a yogurt in too? Something sweet?

Oh, what have you put in your reception starters lunches?

LOL.
Shove in a cereal bar then go and do something useful like making sure your camera batteries are charged so you can take photos in the morning.

Blimey, how long is she going to be there for tomorrow .

I don't think you need to put the breadsticks and dip in. I would get rid of the apple - it will go brown and put a homemade biscuit in instead. No Cereal bar. She will be eating your contents all day long

dd has chool dinners. but in the holidays she went to holiday club where they needed a packed lunch. i too was very excited about this and took great interest in making her lunch. however. after day 1 she said she wanted only a very small lunch so she had more time to play. hence forth she had a small sandwich, 1 slice of bread only, a packet of crisps (which she'd only eat half of), and a bottle of water. no yoghurt, no extra snacky things. she was more excited to chat to her chums than sit eating a faffy lunch with a load of tupperware to contend with.

she takes a snack to school, usually an apple, and this goes in a inflatable snack holder thing that attaches to her book bag.

Yes the apple will go brown - there's already a couple of her 5-a-day in there, so you can take it out.
Does she need a cheese sandwich and cheese as an extra.

She's there for 5 1/4 hours. It's not that much food is it? It's all quite small amounts. Well I'd sooner she brought stuff home than went hungry.

Camera batteries! Yes!

She prob doesn't need cheese sandwich AND cheese, but I happened to have some grilled halloumi in the fridge and she loves it so I popped a slice in.

Home made biscuit? I don't have any home made biscuits.

Eeek. My little girl is going to school. In shiny black shoes.

:o at this.

You have NO idea how quickly the novelty will wear off. I have been making packed lunches for 19 years on and off (yes, really - I spaced my DCs out too well) and now I just slump against the fridge lobbing random bits of food in a box.

But your lunch sounds great - I'd only hesitate with the fruit juice, because lots of schools have a water only policy.

I'll pop in a cereal bar. Just in case.

I bought one of those banana guards to keep her banana in and we've been having bananaguard opening lessons today .

Yes, by the time poor neglected 2nd born ds goes off I shall probably advise him to have a rummage in the fridge before he heads off. But right now it is exciting!

I don't think it is too much, tbh (assuming you know how much your dd normally eats!)

dd1 takes lunch, and 2 snacks.

a typical day for her (I send hot meals with her, as school happy with this) might be:

box of raisins
banana
pear/nectarine/apple
packet of rice cakes (usually 5 in a pack, I think)/small packet of vegetable crisps
maybe a small pot of strawberries/blueberries if there are some that need using up.
meal: curry & rice, spag bol, spanish omelette, or a sandwich.

her lunch box always comes back empty, and she is desperate for her tea!

Yuno, it really does get boring after a time.. I so look forward to a Friday when DS2 has a school dinner and I whooped for joy when DS2 asked for money for the canteen instead of a pack up when he started secondary two years ago. In fact at DS1's school, they are refurbishing the kitchen and my heart sank when DS1 said he may have to take a pack up for a while..

when DS1 asked for money

it sounds fine yuno, she won't have time to eat much more than that i wouldn't have thought.

apple will be fine, ds1 sometimes requests his cut up and it doesn't go brown.

Dredge the cut up apple in lemon juice and/or sugar and it won't go too brown.