Lunch

Once a week I "let" the kids eat school lunch. This usually happens towards the end of the week, when my only packing options are a can of Artichoke Hearts and some dijon mustard. The girls love school lunch, and that's no lie. I don't know how they stomach the stuff.

The other 4 days of the school week I insist on making their lunches. I abide by only a few rules: (mostly) healthy; (mostly) balanced, and (mostly) non-packaged food. And the girls only grumble a little.

To make things easier, I pre-make some meals and freeze them. And so we tend to have a soup day (Bela's current favorite is lentil; Mae loves Hearty Split Pea); a "pocket" day  of homemade calzones, a veggie and dip day, usually a leftover dinner day, which ranges from pasta to casseroles to pizza. I toss in fruit, cucumbers from the garden, popcorn or nuts to round it all out. And when available, a little treat.

They get very excited about the treat, sometimes to my annoyance.

"Fruit is a real treat", I say. "You don't need dessert every day", I say. "Sugar isn't good for lunch" I say.

Last week, Mae was helping me make dinner (which was to also become their lunch for the next day). After we ate, I plopped Gillian in the tub and Mae decided to help out with the kitchen duties. She cleaned up the table, washed the dishes, and then continued to make MY lunch for the next day.

I was tickled! But I can't lie: I was pretty bummed when I sat down to eat, ravenously hungry.

A Mae Mae special: Cucumber salad with carrots, salt and pepper. Another, less flavorful, salad with raw mushrooms, cucumbers and celery. A banana.. And (thank goodness) two little chocolate chip cookies we had just made.

I wonder if the girls feel as sad at lunch time as I did as I ate my two salads, and my "treat" of a banana.

Thank goodness for chocolate.