Food, bday parties and toddlers

[failingmammalian]

When you're at a tea party or birthday party , do you let your toddlers just eat what they want or try to restrict? The other day I faced all kinds of judgie comments for trying to rein in my 18-mth old's apparently insatiable appetite for sweet treats (background is we hardly ever have such things at home , only on special occasions and suddenly she was faced with a massive table full of sweet stuff, and people eating for about two hours!. I don't want to send the wrong messages, And frankly I'm a bit lost. Help! Should I be giving her sweet stuff more often so it's not such a big deal? In laws think I'm mad to only give fruit and natural yog for pudding ...how to teach moderation?

Our plan to teach moderation is to have sweet stuff at home, then when my ds sees it as a party he won't need to gorge on it.
He's nearly 3 so I have no idea if this will work! However, he has a bit of chocolate most days. He will often stop before he gets to the end of what I have deemed an appropriate portion (about 12 buttons).
He also has crisps quite often.. Maybe half a packet of pom bears 3 times a week.

I grew up in a house with nothing bad as my dad had a colesterol scare. I am seriously addicted to sugar!!!

Kx

And... Fruit is often billed as a wonder super thing for children to eat but it's still packed with sugar. My son doesn't eat much fruit (his choice) but I'm not sure I'd push it at every meal.

Just a thought?

I half hartedly do the 'if you have a bite of this sandwich then you can have some pink biscuits' thing but generally all the 'good' stuff is piled on the table with the treats so I let him eat whatever he likes.

DS in 3 and would eat quavers and chocolate buttons all day if he could.

But, we have never 'done' puddings in our house. I am always quite curious about why people do puddings. I know adults who have pudding every day with their main meal and do the same with their kids. When I was growing up a pudding was a treat not an every day occurance. I have quite a lot of fat friends.

I was worried about this at dd's 1st birthday last week so did mostly savoury stuff and then got odd looks for not having sweet treats. dd doesn't have a lot at home but she doesn't have a lot of fruit as something in the juices triggers her eczema so I do limit her.

I guess you ignore the judgey pants wearing parents and do what suits your dc and your ethos.

Personally I would try and restrict the worst of the sweet stuff at this age. I mean things with no nutritional value such as haribo. My old dentist told me that if you largely restrict sweet stuff until age 3 then the child is less likely to develop a sweet tooth. Maybe a load of old rubbish, maybe not.

Saying that I am having a party for my 4 yo this weekend and I will be providing biscuits and cakes, I will not be providing sweets either for the meal or as a going home present. I don't see why I should spend my money on it if I don't approve. If people want to judge me, let them! I'm the one paying the dentists bill not them!

At a birthday party I tend to just give up and hope something that goes in has some kind of nutritional value!

However dd (18mo) will have natural yoghurt and fresh fruit / a portion of fruit or veg (cucumbers a fav ATM) / jelly with fruit for pudding after her dinner, mainly because without it she would be seriously lacking on her 5 a day! Once our meal times start to collide a bit more and we eat as a family (dd eats at 5.30 ATM!) then it will stop because we very very rarely have pudding!!