Snacking All The Time, In the NY Times

Are your kids always fishing for food?

There’s nothing like being validated, is there? Especially, I have to say, by the New York Times.

Just yesterday, a friend of mine sent me a link to a story in the Times about — wait for it — how kids today snack too much.

Yeah, been there, said that.

The writer, Jennifer Steinhauer, herself a parent, laments how kids can never go anywhere or do anything without snacks being involved. And it’s not just the pretzels, Goldfish and juice boxes moms stash in our bags (just in case of low blood sugar and/or a meltdown) while we’re out and about with kids. It’s also the amount of times we’re asked, as moms, to provide snack for this or that activity or event or meeting.

I fully understand the point of some snacks, as I wrote months ago, when this blog was still new. I get that toddler tummies are tiny, and it’s hard for little ones to manage the long stretch between breakfast and lunch, or lunch and dinner, without a tiding-over. I get that snacks can strategically fill in nutritional gaps (didn’t finish his breakfast milk? A 10 a.m. cheese stick or yogurt is a good calcium-and-vitamin-D boost).

What I don’t get, and never will, is the idea that kids of all ages need food to accompany just about anything they do. Let’s stop calling snacks anything virtuous (the tummy-tider-over; the nutritional gap-filler), and be honest: we use snacks as an event in themselves; a boredom-buster; a tantrum-avoider (hence, as my friend Gretchen told me, the growing number of parents who bring snacks church–as though you can’t ask a 5-year-old to go foodless for an hour. In church).

Snacks are a crutch.

You can’t go a soccer game without a snack. Sure, they play hard, so the orange slices and water bottles at half-time are good. But the Munchkins after? Apparently, my friend Susan told me, you can’t go to a Brownie or Girl Scout meeting without a little somethin’-somethin’ either (I have boys; hence, no Brownies, and I haven’t broached the world of Cub scouting yet). Says Susan, a 7:30 pm Brownie meeting for a bunch of first-graders must be aided and abetted by donuts and cookies. Really? Didn’t they just have dinner? Don’t they have to go to bed, like, soon? You can’t go to a Mommy & Me class without food. My younger son James was in a gymnastics class a couple of years ago, and he was the only one who left after the hour of tumbling and balancing; everyone else had signed up for a second hour of crafts. And … a snack.

I am quick to add here, my kids do get snacks. Of course they get them at school because frankly I think I’d be hauled up in front of a very disapproving PTA if I didn’t send in my second-grader and kindergartner with their daily snacks (along with lunch). I agree with that, and I’m a big fan of our principal, who frowns on junky snacks, and both my sons’ teachers this year, who have stressed that the kids should bring in water, not juice, for snack (probably more to avoid sticky spills on desks than for health, but I’ll take it!).  I have bought vending-machine fare for the boys as a treat (though I steer them to pretzels and popcorn, and away from candy bars and Pop-Tarts, and I often require them to hang on to the goodies until after dinner. They comply).

How do you feel about the ubiquitous culture of snacks? Not about the necessary, between-meals, nutritious snacks, but the “here, kid, have a dollar for the vending machine because I can’t bear to hear you whining any more” snacks? Can your kids get together with an organized group without sniffing around for juice and cookies?