Healthy start: Kids need the best you can give. Picture: Monkey Business
My brother puts an apple in his kids’ lunches in case an adult ever checks. He told me he renews the apple every 10,000km.
School lunches can be a bit hit and miss in our house, too. I have good days and bad days. I’d clearly hit a good patch this week.
As I collected my daughter from school for her doctor’s appointment she grabbed her lunch. As we talked to the doctor she took it out and proceeded to eat it in a most business like fashion.
Usually in a circumstance like this, your child takes out the sticky chocolate donut they talked you in to buying in a weak moment at the supermarket. The doctor then raises her eyebrows and murmurs something about how the child’s condition may relate to poor diet. She might even hand you a brochure on major food groups.
God has given me children with the dangerous mixture of perfect timing and opportunistic wickedness. They would probably say something like, “Yeah, Mum it’d be great if we could we have some healthy food.” Then comes that angelic smile. Strangling them later in the car park never seems to aid my recovery. The damage is done.
Now if I were rational I’d have to admit the doctor probably didn’t notice what my daughter was eating on this particular day. However, for me it was a religious experience – my kid was eating healthy food that I had prepared.
This week I really got my act together and roasted a free-range chook especially for lunches and hunted fresh lettuce and carrots and wholemeal organic bread.
Each morning I’d take out the frozen bread and make a generous chicken sandwich overflowing with long carrot slithers and fresh-cropped lettuce, then some mayo.
These sandwiches are my daughter’s absolute favourite. There in front of the doctor she chomped away at them. From somewhere there was orchestra music. My chest swelled with pride. The angels came down from heaven and crowned me “Mother of the Week”.
Where were the TV cameras? This was a moment to treasure and relive. A newspaper headline. CHILD EATS HEALTHY SCHOOL LUNCH IN FRONT OF FAMILY GP.
