The allure of cafeteria food

This morning while Amelia was eating her yogurt for breakfast I put her lunch box on the table. She looked up at me and asked, "Mommy, do you think I can sometimes forget my lunch?" I asked her why and she said because she really likes some of the choices they have at school. I told her that I thought we could probably do that and we would look at the September menu and pick some days. I printed one off at work today and we'll look at it over the weekend. What a big girl!

I pack her lunch so that I know she has food that she will eat and I can also check and make sure she did eat. I am not sure how well she can handle a cafeteria tray and I'm a little concerned she'll be so distracted by everything else that goes on that she may not eat. Like most kids, her little body and overall mood is very affected by whether or not she has had enough to eat and I'm a little worried that by the end of the school day she will be a bit of a whiny monster if she doesn't eat enough at lunch. But as my mother would say, growing up is saying good-bye. She will figure it out.

And yesterday morning when she slept a little later than usual (getting up at 7 am instead of her normal 6:30 am) she wasn't excited about eating her yogurt. She turned to me and said, "They have breakfast at school, you know." I told her I did know that (breakfast is free for all kindergarteners) but I wasn't sure that she always liked what they served. (The other day she told me they gave her poptarts for breakfast and I about died. How is that nutritional?)