Snack Attack

My kids and I pretty much snack all day long. It has gotten progressively worse, to the point that whenever they say "I'm hungry" I toss them a cracker or granola bar which they do not even finish because they just had three bites of something else recently. So by the end of the day there are half eaten things all over the kitchen and I am frustrated but I know it's my own fault. (I have to congratulate myself on moving most eating to the kitchen though! Up until recently they were dragging their food all over the house. Which often led to Daphne spitting chocolate milk down the heating register, and Alex dropping slices of cheese in after that - where do they get these ideas?!)

Anyway, one of the big problems that has resulted is that they don't even know what it is to be truly "hungry" anymore. Most of the time I think they just say it when they're bored (especially Daphne).

I still eat a full breakfast and lunch of course because I'm bigger and breastfeeding and always hungry. They, on the other hand, rarely sit down to a real meal (except when Steve comes home and we all sit down for dinner, and then they complain that they don't like it or they aren't hungry - because they probably just had a snack less than an hour before! - and we have to fight to keep them at the table while we try to gobble down our food before Alex starts throwing his... it's lots of fun).

I knew of course that this wasn't the best way to feed my kids, but I didn't see the connection between constant snacking and picky eating until I read a book called "French Kids Eat Everything" by Karen Le Billon. It was pretty interesting, with lots of good ideas to help improve the way our family eats ("No snacking between meals" is just one of ten "French Food Rules" the author describes). And it makes sense - if you are truly hungry, you'll be more open to trying new foods.

So then, inspired by this book, I wanted to change just about EVERYthing about the way we eat. But I knew that wasn't realistic. We'd have to start small, and take it one step at a time. So my first goal is to establish regular meal times with NO SNACKING in between. Simple enough, but it's not going to be pretty!