Dd 7 giving me grief re her healthy lunchbox

[MrsHeffley]

Not entirely sure what to do,damned if I do and damned if I don't.

Said lunchbox isn't the most healthy lunchbox in the world but seems to be healthy than her friends ie boring and unfair. Apparently she's the only child who doesn't have a packet of crisps, choc biscuit and other assorted crap.

She has
a w/m sandwich
cheese/cheese string
carrots
yog
a treat(home made muffin/flap jack etc)
Innocent juice water

I'm fine with fat,small amount of sugar and salt but I don't do msg,trans fats,chemicals or large amounts of salt/sugar on a regular basis(trans fats/msg never).She has sweets couple of times a month and I bake a lot so she has cake or biscuits when she gets home from school etc.She's not deprived or on boot camp rations by any means.

Lots of her friends have mini sausage rolls(I'm fussy about cheap meat),Quavers,choc desserts and biscuits all in one lunch. Apparently her lunchbox is the worst on the table every day.

She was really upset tonight,genuinely so.I think she's getting teased and there is a small amount of showing off.So I told her tough luck as I had no intention of sending in/paying for crisps,sausage rolls daily and explained the issues re too much fat,crap etc and said if she ate too much she'd get spotty and unhealthy(avoided the f word).She then promptly said she'd be informing her friends that they were going to get ill and spotty. .

I'm going to be sooooo popular.

Kind of at a loss as to what to do.I want her to stick up for herself,eat a healthy lunch but would kind of like her to keep my views about lunch boxes to herself.I'm prepared to compromise.She has fish and chips on a Friday at school and I'd be ok with sending in the odd choc biscuit instead of my heinous homemade stuff but how do I justify my lunchboxes without turning her into a prig? Also am I being mean with what I send in and do I need to compromise more and if so how?I'm not mentioning this to her teacher as I don't want the lunchbox police to start patrolling(our school is fairly balanced re lunchbox content).

Could she maybe have a packet of crisps or chocolate biscuit once a week? I would have said Friday but she has school dinners that day.

Girls can be mean. My dss have homemade cake. Stick to the lunch you give her. Does she like crisps? Maybe let her have some low fat ones on a Friday as a little bit won't do her any harm. It is important for children to feel part of the gang. I don't mean you should compromise teaching her healthy eating, but to fit in with the gang once a week will let her know you have listened.

I imagine that most of the lunchboxes will be like the one you send in, going by my experience of being in school halls at lunchtime.

We have the same thing. I gave in somewhat and occasionally give DS little yoghurt things and he sometimes gets crisps. I wondered about this when I arrived at my childminders to find DS saying to the other children (who all looked rather horrified) 'no, really, KFC is actually very bad -it's made from beaks and bones and poorly chickens'

Dd has crisps twice a week, usually quavers or wotsits but as every day she has wholemeal s/w or wrap with proper meat in and salad or pasta tub plus two pieces of fruit and a snack sized piece of cheese I figure the crisps and one or two choc biscuits won't do too much harm.

Having had serious food issues myself as a child and throughout teen years and adult hood, some of which stem from not being allowed cheese biscuits crisps chips or anything else my mother declared would make me fat, I am cautious not to make a fuss.

Of course I'm not saying this is the case for everyone.

I mean, I wondered about how to teach DS what I believe without making him standout or sound like a food snob

Very hard you have my sympathy. I am lucky in that DC's school has healthy food status and so parents get calls from school if they send in crisps, chocolate, cake etc etc. On the first day of the month allowed plain crisps as a treat!

You can make sausage rolls and freeze, take one out each day, using good quality sausages. And homemade biscuits (although I see you already do homemade treats). Are occasional crisps so bad. I wouldn't go for low calorie rather ones without the salt and chemicals.

They do but it's odd -fruit only at playtime(which I'm not 100% happy about as she's starving by lunch) and we're given advice re sticking to a healthy lunchbox but it's not enforced (thankfully as I have friends in other schools which are really strict and it sounds horrendous).

Maybe I could do the crisps on a Monday as you say instead of cheese..

I'm in this situation too. Can you still get those crisps with a packet of salt in? If so she could have those and not put the salt on.

I will sometimes send a bar of chocolate or even home made ice cream in a flask. I am pretty much only doing that for the 'cool' factor!

Can you make sausage rolls with better sausages?

I'm a lunchtime supervisor in a primary school, I look after pack lunch eaters mainly. It
sounds like she has a pretty normal lunchbox TBH .
If you want to ring the changes, the odd choc biscuit occasionally, white bread sometimes instead of w/m, scone or roll sometimes instead of bread? The odd slice of cold ( home made) pizza might go down well. Do you vary what's in her sandwich? Ham or cheese seem to be the standard two with peanut butter or nutella the next most popular. Sandwich spread, cucumber or anything salad marks you out as a bit weird.

I give DS a few crisps/ pretzels/tortilla chips/ hula hoops in his box ( somedays) rather than a whole bag. They might BE in the bag but I will have removed half the packet.

How well do your cakes/ flapjacks travel coz mine always end up as crumbs in a lunch box? DS dislikes cake in his box because of the state it gets in ( unless its fairy cake/ muffin with iceing, which seem to travel better.

DS currently accepts that his lunchbox has to contain things we have in the house, which rules out frubes/ cheese strings/ fruit strings/ jelly sweets/ transformer snacks/ pom bears etc which a lot of his peers have. I'm not buying things JUST for him, they have to be for all 3 of our pack lunches.

Oh heavens. I am also the worst mother In The World because I don't let DD have crisps and sweets in her packed lunch.
She likes bags of fresh popcorn though - they're worth trying for the cool factor.

Oooh yes, we make sausage rolls and scotch eggs (we have chickens, use meat from farmers market and bake instead of frying).

what school do they go to that they are allowed chocolate puddings, crips and chocolate biscuits???

my dds have wholemeal ham/cheese sandwiches or pasta salad, cereal bar & either fruit or salad box -and either fresh orange or apple juice

pretty standard lunch really

I give mine crisps but they are home made veggie crisps I dare the DC Teacher to tell me that they are unhealthy
uktv.co.uk/food/recipe/aid/514191

I don't ban sweets ,choc or crisps I just don't want her thinking a lunch needs to contain crisps,choc etc.It doesn't.The salt/crap in a daily packet of crisps will add up.When I used to teach my class all had packed lunches in my c/r and nobody had a lunchbox without crisps every single day,some kids had 2 packs.I want her to be able to learn how to make a healthy lunch for herself one day.I mirror what my mum sent me in with.

She has homemade popcorn, crap free crisps at the weekend now and again when we watch a film.Sweets once a week when we remember and sweets at Xmas.Easter,parties etc.She doesn't do too bad and I don't ban anything only trans fats and msg.

She doesn't wolf down crap at all.She hates fizzy drink,doesn't even like dark choc only white and 9 times out of 10 chucks the remainder of her Xmas/Easter, haul away.Even sweets from the sweet shop she never finishes.

Sadly can't afford school dinner X 3 daily.

Come to think of it our school has some healthy status,wondering if she's embellishing however I did get a whole lot of detail even down to how mini many sausage rolls said child was lucky enough to have instead of sandwiches.

I think that potato slice crisps instead of wotsits/quavers occasionally (or just a handful instead of a full packet regularly) could boost her lunch esteem!

Dd's friends were all into fruit winders but now their mum's probably hate me because dd started a fashion for yo-yo fruit rolls that are 100percent fruit but more expensive

You mean the bear ones with cards in-we have those.

littleducks it was you lol
MrsHeffley two of mine are a little older and one younger their lunches today were
1 wrap filled with hummus, salad of baby toms cucumber, bean sprouts and romaine lettuce with ceasar dressing and bacon bits--am in trouble due to calories teacher complained]
I banana, grapes, sliced kiwi
2 baby aldi yoghurt [the mini ones]
1 ottle of water and small bottle of home squeeze fruit and veg juice carrot and apple today
They leave house at 8.30 am and we get home at 4.30

I have had the same conversation.

I do crisps once a week now.

But if I believe DS then some children just have 2 packs of crisps.

Sadly I think he might be telling the truth :(