(all that's left today)

 

I’m sitting here in a classroom filled with middle schoolers, trying to do work while not eavesdropping. They’re participating in Model UN, a club where they learn about current events, negotiations, parliamentary procedure, and how to listen to each other. The noise level is probably what you ought to expect when you get forty-odd (forty odd works too) pre-teens and teens in a room.

It’s impressive.

The teacher just quieted them down to work with them as a group.

Also impressive.

I’m in this room because it was too much for me to think about heading home and back here again (a 30 minute round trip) – but also because I brought snack.

Snack is not just for the toddler set. These kids can eat. And eat and eat and eat and eat. There is no way they can go straight to an afterschool activity without getting some kind of sustenance into their bodies.

So the teacher asked all parents to donate money for the snack fund, or invited us to bring in a snack, maybe for about 20 kids. Silly me, to think that that meant there were 20 kids in the group. My son did Model UN when he was in the middle school – I should have remembered. Or asked, that would have worked.

I get a bee in my bonnet about snack. It’s far too easy to fall into the trap of processed foods. Shelf-stable, “kid-friendly” foods. Like Goldfish or chips or cookies or granola bars. I’m not immune to the call of pantry staples, and the kids eat those like they’ve never eaten anything in their lives.

But the morning I received the note about snack donation was the morning someone posted an article about such foods, lamenting the fact that kids these days don’t learn about food preparation in school. And I decided that I would bring in a snack – a healthy, whole food snack.

Apples, cheese, crackers (okay, I caved a little), grapes, tomatoes, carrots, hummus, and cashews. With a little more effort I could have made it a fully “C” day.

I sort of thought nobody would eat anything, or I’d hear something about “eew health food.” Maybe I will later, from Maddie, who only asked me to make sure I brought in apples and cheese.

All that’s left is a bag of baby carrots, some hummus, and a handful of cashews.

Either they were too hungry to complain about it, or this healthy food hit the spot.

I feel like a badass today. Sticking to my principles and feeding kids.