2 year olds - snack on demand or timetable?

[Shoegazer]

DD (2.2) is a good eater. She very often tells me she is hungry and would like a snack and I usually will give her something, but it feels like too many snacks to me. She eats well at mealtimes, so its not spoiling her appetite and I know that she should eat when she is hungry but at times this is constant. Her snacks are generally well balanced so I'm not too worried about what she is eating.

She is a very early riser (weep) and often wakes at 5am, we have tried everything to change this but nothing works and we are both early risers and would generally be up at 6am anyway so I think its in the genes. Anyway, this then means she has her breakfast at around 5.30 as understandably she is hungry when she wakes. Her lunchtime is at 12-1pm and her tea is at 4.30-5pm. At the moment she snacks between meals, but not usually allowed in the 1 hr before meals. Could she benefit from a mid morning substantial snack, rather than bits through the morning? How does your 2 year old eat? Am I giving her too much? Am I just too neurotic? Help!

dd is 2.2

she's up about 7.30ish. breakfast 8am. that's whatever she asks for so maybe toast, maybe jam sandwich, maybe cereal, maybe fruit.

we keep busy through the morning and she doesn't ask for any more food.

then bang on 11am she ALWAYS asks for lunch. this is usually a sandwich of 2 slices of bread and some salad and then a yoghurt or rice pudding or fruit.

she then gets hungry at about 2.30pm so will have maybe malt loaf or a snack plate of cheese, dried fruit, cucumber, whatever we have in.

she then has her main meal at 4.30pm which is a hot dinner of something or other like pasta (half the portion i would eat) or fish and veg, or whatever. she then sometimes wants pudding or not. we let her decide. this would be maybe a fairy cake or sponge cake with custard.

we did blw and still follow the idea of letting her decide how much and when she eats.

some days she doesn't want breakfast, so she doesn't have it. i don't push it.

she always has a banana and a cup of milk at bedtime too.

i absolutely hate it when dd eats a full plate of food and someone like MIL throws praise at her saying oooh haven't you done well??!!!!

...er at what??

fine to praise eating nicely or whatever but not the amount.

We do a snack box in an ice cube tray for weekend mornings so we can stay in bed for a little bit longer - (by a little bit longer I mean like till 7am or something not a real lie-in) - fill it with bits and pieces like blueberries, rice cakes, sometimes the odd tiny treat like a single chocolate button under a pile of raisins which is always fun. During the day they have a good breakfast , toast and porridge about 8am but by 10 they are inevitably hungry and have rice cakes, fruit etc but I tend to go with the flow - yesterday dd had brekkie then 2 hours later wanted scrambled egg on toast which was fine; she still ate lunch. Being little is hungry work.

Well she ate a normal amount of dinner and yogurt and strawberries afterwards. She took another biscuit and asked for milk before her bedtime, but we haven't had the dreaded "I'm hungry" and the exasperated "No you can't be" all afternoon which was lovely. I was worried that she would eat all in the snackbox and then ask for more, but she didn't and she also ate more of what she would normally turn down in the hope of a "better" snack i.e a biscuit, because it was all there for her to choose from I suppose. So I'm feeling positive so far.

well done, that sounds great.

ruddy norah - does your dd always eat lunch at 11 then? sometimes ds asks for lunch at 11 but i always try and last him out til 11:30 cos i feel 11 is a bit early.

Hmm, I made the snack box up this morning. It is 8am and she has demolished:

1 small homemade biscuit
1 box of raisins
Most of an apple
4 cherry tomatoes
1/2 a small pitta bread
a couple of cucumber sticks

and now she is waving the cereal bar at me to open.
So is she a human dustbin? I'm trying so hard to let her get on with it, but I'm struggling! This is still the novelty isn't it?

It might be the novelty, but that's what littlest manky is like too! I would keep doing it for a couple of weeks and see.

Thats what I have agreed with DH, 2 weeks trial as he was very dubious about the whole idea. I'm very glad to know that there is another little one with a huge appetite out there. She is currently doing "gymnastics" across the rug so at least she is using up the energy!

it's much much better for most people's blood sugar to eat little and often, so I would be happy with the snacking as long as it's healthy snacks, which it sure looks like it is !!

My mum disagrees and thinks that I shouldn't let DS snack and he should be made to eat a big meal. But from personal experience, if my blood sugar drops I'm more likely to have a huge unhealthy refined carby meal than a nice healthy soup or salad because I have to meet that energy craving, immediately ! So I kind of apply the same tactics to ds and let him eat what he wants, when he wants. Mostly he snacks throughtout the day but also has 3 fair sized meals too. Theres a definite link betweek high GI diets and obesity, so I think all you are doing is meeting your DD's natural dietary requirements. also, she's more likely to meet all her nutritional requirements by eating a variety of foods throughout the day.

hmm maybe I should be increasing DS's food then??

usually he'll have 2 bits of toast & jam with milk on waking up. (between half 7 - half 8)
snack if he's at the creche is between 10-11am, and is usually either a pot of cut fruit, or an apple (or such likes) at home he doesn't usually have one - doesn't always eat it all.
lunch (between 12-1) is usually a sandwich, cherry toms, cucumber, pepper sticks. fruit or yoghurt he usually has what he wants with water. (which is on offer all day)
no afternoon snack - but he can help himself to fruit if he wants.
dinner approx 5pm is a main hot meal usually (unless he's had a 'big' lunch - ie beans on toast etc) but is cottage pie & veg, roast, which he has a good portion of - i'd say deffo a good small plate of. and fruit/yoghurt for afters.

then milk for bed at 7pm.

(ponders if he's eating enough) he's got a little pop belly at the minute- but then again he went dead lanky as he shot up but not out - guess the out is now! lol.

I also find thou that he (he's 2.5 btw) has days when he'll pick but not really eat anything, and others he eats everything in sight - so when he's eating I try to fill him up, but when he's not I try to get at least one good meal a day into him. if that makes sence?

Thanks puffylovett, I think what you have said makes sense.

I don't think your DS eats too little SpandexIsMyEnemy, from what I have gathered from this thread the idea is to encourage them to eat what they need and not to push or deny food. I likened it to demand breastfeeding when I was talking to DH about it last night, so just like that your toddler will eat what they need and some will eat more and others less, its just the natural variation.

Thats a really good way of putting it Shoegazer!
Actually, when I think about it the other two after the first few months BF settled down and only looked for a feed every few hours, plus slept through from 8 weeks. Littlest Manky fed every 60/90 minutes in the day and only went max 3 hours at night.
So maybe there is a link to the feeding on demand, that they know what they need when they need it! Although my mum would say I had just allowed him to get into a bad habit.

We have a rule. Ds has a ferocious appetite. Eat/snack as much as he likes, but he must eat his 3 main meals.
I.e dinner is at say 6.30pm = shepherds pie.
he can snack all afternoon, on crisps, bananas, fruit, raisans, but if we get to dinner time and he says he's not hungry, then there is a problem.
Happens , once in a blue moon.

Ds has always been an early riser. He gets up at 6. Fine by me. Dh does too. We have never even bothered to try to get him to sleep later. Sometimes he does. Till 8.30am. No logic to it. He goes to bed at 7 and is asleep before I get out the door at 7.05pm.
This works for us.
He eats breakfast as soon as he gets up.
Plus at 2.2, she may be going through a hunger spurt. It all sounds good to me. Stop worrying and just go with it.

Keep me posted on the snack box progress!

Today DS refused his oatibix !
But turns out yesterday he didn't do his usual 6am poo, and must have been bunged up! Between 6-7 he did 3 poos then after that ate as normal... ie, constantly!

I find that very occasionally he is notso interested in food, usually around a developmental milestone, just now we are potty training, so not unexpected.

Hope today went ok too!

DS (2) has a mid morning snack - usually around 11 before he goes for a sleep. Either a banana, or some fruit toast, or sometimes half an apple and 3 little mini Hob Nob type things (or "nack" as DS calls them). He doesn't usually have a snack in the afternoon, but that depends more on if he seems hungry.

Ok, here is the report from yesterday!
I made up the snack box and left it in the kitchen. When she came up and said "I'm hungry mummy!" I duly went and got the snackbox and yes she did go through it again and eat a fair amount over the morning. She kept coming up to me and saying "I'm hungry" and then I would tell her to remember her snackbox and she could have whatever she liked from it. Then abit later she came up and said "I'm hungry" and I again pointed out the snackbox and she looked at it and then said "No, I not hungry. I tired.". Now given that she NEVER says that she is tired this is a real difference for me. This is the toddler who could be falling asleep sat next to you but if you ask if she is tired she denies it completely. Later on, we had an "I'm hungry" replaced with an "I'm thirsty" again another new one on me.
Her eating slowed down over the afternoon and she ate normal amounts at mealtimes.

Another good thing is that she is trying new things to eat, she has always been fairly adventurous, but the pressure of being given sometrhing new to eat for a snack has usually meant she asks for an old favourite instead. Well because its all there already and up to her what and when she eats it, she sat eating sugar snap peas yesterday, something she would normally refuse.

She also didn't nap yesterday, preferring just abit of TV time for a rest.

During the evening I could hear her talking upstairs and she was sleep talking and saying "I'm hungry." "I not hungry" (I kid you not, as I type it it sounds like a wind up!) so it has obviously made some impact on her.

All in all I'm a convert. She still got up at 5am though lol!