<p>I was thrilled whenever the kids went to a school where they could buy lunch. Otherwise I tossed packages into a bag. Packages of cheese, carrots, chips, m&ms, etc. It worked.</p>
<p>However, I made my kids breakfast every morning. Real breakfast. And real dinner most nights. (Friday night was pizza night, and we had takeout chinese at least once a week.)</p>
<p>My personal belief is that lunch doesn’t matter, but breakfast does. </p>
<p>I think the key thing here is to HAVE a belief.</p>
<p>SRMom…thats amazing…He actually ate all that?</p>
<p>4% bodyfat…is that for real . I have never heard of such low bf even in athletes.</p>
<p>In D’s case she hates the sight of food in the am so I do allow her to eat what she can get down…which is usually a luna bar or something small.
She gets up at 5:45 to catch the 6:30 bus and she has a tough time eating that early.</p>
<p>calmom said:
Haha. That reminds me of a Fox Trot I cut out of the paper:</p>
<p>Paige: What’d you make me for lunch?</p>
<p>Mother: Peanut butter and jelly</p>
<p>Paige: Again? Mother I am so sick of peanut butter and jelly, it isn’t even funny! If I have to eat it one more time, I’m going to cough up blood and die! I’m serious!</p>
<p>Mother: You could always make your own lunches.</p>
<p>Paige: PB&J’s fine.</p>
<p>Mother: I thought as much.</p>
<p>Nope, they serve “brunch” at my son’s h/s, and I figure any high school that is serving brunch can do better than what I can whip up every morning, i.e. 6-day old bread and questionable lunchmeat. :)</p>
<p>I know somebody who used to bring her two sons a hot lunch every day when the boys were in junior high school. These kids were big, strapping boys, a grade apart, and I think they both had facial hair by the time they were in 7th grade. Dumb as posts with calf muscles the size of tree trunks. The high school coaches were drooling over them & couldn’t wait until they got to high school.</p>
<p>Having hot lunches hand-delivered to them by their mother didn’t make them perform any better in school. I think, all it did was make the mom feel better. ;)</p>
<p>Okay, from a teacher whose students eat in the classroom, here are my observations:</p>
<ol>
<li><p>there is a wonderful classroom economy built entirely around lunches.</p></li>
<li><p>the degree to which a child craves a food is directly correlllated to the size of the hives the food causes.</p></li>
<li><p>parents very rarely have a clue about what their child does/does not eat at lunch. </p></li>
<li><p>yes, whole, untouched sandwiches are thrown away daily ( I know, not by your child…)</p></li>
<li><p>they really don’t care if there are starving children in China (and I remember an obese teacher of mine telling me this in first grade and wondering why she didn’t give up some of her food instead of annoying me about mine.)</p></li>
<li><p>hot lunches are not necessarily a hallmark of bad parenting. a chef’s salad purchased at our school looks a lot better than the lunchables many parents “pack” these days which contain (grimace) candy bars and soda.</p></li>
<li><p>there is always one child who wants to eat all leftovers.</p></li>
<li><p>there is always one child who eats nothing.</p></li>
<li><p>there is always a parent who wants to “bring” lunch who ends up being 45 minutes late and then causes the child to have to eat late, while doing math.</p></li>
<li><p>we will never unlock the mysteries of the childhood diet. Just because you pack it doesn’t mean they a) like it b) eat it, but c) even the little ones appreciate the effort as they scrape off mayo and throw away bologna so they can eat white bread plain. Go figure.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>(before anyone flames on me, we do not allow trading due to food allergies, parental annoyance, and the occasional debate over the comparative value of Pringles and Doritos)</p>
<p>momof1, I loved that list!! 
As a matter of fact, I used to wonder why my mother wouldn’t send the untouched portion of beets on my plate over to the “starving children of the world” when she gave me that speech. BTW, I still won’t touch beets ;)</p>
<p>For our kids, they have always brought their own lunches. I admit that I am NOT a morning person and am lucky that my H makes their sandwiches in the morning (I do night-time chores like last minute laundry and such).
The boys have never liked school lunches and only want it on certain days that they have a particular food, although I don’t remember what it is. After I read Fast Food Nation, I never wanted them to eat school food again! :eek:
Since older S has a car, he and his friends often come home for lunch and just eat whatever leftovers they can find in the fridge. Although I know they sometimes go out if they have the money.</p>
<p>whaddyall think about moms (don’t know of any dads), that make a hot lunch and take to their kid during lunch time in HS, and then wait in the parking lot to take the containers home?</p>
<p>They should get a life. ;)</p>
<p>Seriously demented :eek: .</p>
<p>BlueBayou: kid has allergies? Family tradition? Enjoys the time spent with their kid? Frankly, I think it’s sweet.</p>
<p>Another Mom recently asked me the same question. I still pack lunch for my just turned 12 yr old. She is getting better, but still a finicky eater…therefore, not worth it to purchase lunch at school. She, too, just lost all her baby fat…thin as a rail…so I prefer to make her lunches to ensure that she eats. Her older sisters…I stopped packing their lunches around 13-14 yrs old…just have a lot of options available for them to do their own packing. We keep our pantry and fridge well stocked during the school yr. It doesn’t take long at all.</p>
<p>Momof1:</p>
<h1>2 made me laugh soooo much…I remember years of frustation (and a few tears) every time that a kid brought in a birthday treat I couldn’t have, our class won a pizza party (I’m allergic to milk products…hives are no fun!), or I couldn’t have the food at summer camp. I was guilty of cheating a few times and/or trading with friends :-)</h1>
<p>My (stay-at-home) mom was kind enough to pack lunches for me when I wanted one throughout my education. (My elementary and middle school only had hot lunch once a week, so I did a lot of bagging it). In high school I ate lunch from school quite a bit (hooray for salad bars!), but I could always ask my mom to make a lunch if I wanted that instead. Even this past summer when I had a fulltime job, my mom made my lunches for me and my dad. (Thanks Mom!!! 
)</p>
<p>My kids have always gone to private schools where lunch was included in the tuition (until HS), so I have rarely made lunches. The school lunches were always good and included open salad bar and choices of various items. In HS my son started to eat lunch from the “cafe” instead of the full-blown cafeteria …more “snack” kind of food and would then eat a larger lunch upon arriving home from school so that he would fuel up before returning to campus for athletic practice. </p>
<p>So, to answer the question…I don’t usually make lunches. The food at school is excellent and already paid for with tuition.</p>
<p>Aha! It is funny because it is true! 
This is a new school year - I haven’t figured out who is who yet! But they are truly Lake Wobegon kids, above average! Lucky me! It’s gonna be a great year and they will all do well whether their parents pack lunch or have them get hot lunch.</p>
<p>Seriously, I believe that it is not the lunch, but the parental involvement that the lunch represents. However it is that parents choose to let children know that school is important, that is the key. </p>
<p>And truly, from teachers everywhere, thanks to all of the parents who care enough and are engaged enough in their children’s lives to make the school-day more comfortable and doable. Whether that takes the form of making lunches or double-checking a spelling paper, it is appreciated!</p>
<p>Whaddyall think about moms (don’t know of any dads), that make a hot lunch and take to their kid during lunch time in HS, and then wait in the parking lot to take the containers home? --bluebayou</p>
<p>Good luck to their future daughters-in-law! :D</p>
<p>What’s your reasoning behind the theory? My mom made my lunch for me up until last year? Now that I get off campus privileges, I buy a lot more since my option are more affordable and less disgusting than the cafeteria food. When the money I’m alotted for the week is out, I throw together a sandwich, or reheat the previous night’s dinner.</p>
<p>I never really know what I want to eat and how much I can spend until the morning before, so its more convenient if I just handle everything on my own (except for the part of where the money for my lunch comes from :))</p>
<p>I don’t think there’s any “reasoning” behind the theory – except that it makes the moms who do it feel good about what they are doing. My “reasoning” behind not making my kids lunch was that my kids would grow up to be more responsible and independent if they had to make their own – I was always careful to keep the frig stocked with their favorite foods, I just figured they could put together a sandwich and grab a banana on their own. But I put “reasoning” in quotes because it is silly – what it really reflects is a different family lifestyle. We were more a grab-and-go, everyone for themselves family -relying a lot on prepackaged foods and the microwave. The truth is that lunch was often “packed” simply by stopping at 7/11 in the mornng on the way to school to pick up a wrapped sandwich - if we were out of the house soon enough, that was always an option. Bottom line: no one was going hungry.</p>
<p>I’ve always made lunch for my kids. S1 is off at college - not my job anymore! Last year S2 got 2 sandwiches, chips and cookies. 3 sandwiches during baseball season. D gets bagel, chips and cookies. She eats the cookies and throws away the bagel. I’m not sure about the chips. I pack a bagel anyway. (This is all Mrs. Kluge’s idea, by the way. Left to my own devices I’d give them cash and be done with it.)</p>
<p>I used to make S’s lunches; it was the same everyday and he never complained. I did ask why he did not buy his lunch at the school cafeteria. The answer was that he had only 20 minutes for lunch, he did not want to spend those 20 mns. queuing for food, and he wanted to eat outside (rain, shine or snow) with his friends.
I know some of his food got eaten by friends and I recently unearthed an uneaten sandwich from underneath a pile of papers, books, that had been on the floor for several weeks at least.
As for why I made the sandwiches: I was making breakfast anyway, so I might as well fix the lunch. No more, however. In a couple of weeks, he’ll be on his own. He just received a package of brownies mix from the college dining services.</p>
<p>Marite, I had my first teary moment in June when I realized I was packing the last of thousands of lunches. That cookie mix got me started again.</p>