My kids don’t eat enough veges. Of more accurately – they hardly eat any. This is my most on-going area of parental anxiety (well, equal to my fear that the joys and freedoms of homeschooling will at some point be outweighed by my kids lack of academic achievement). Even knowing I am riddling them with food issues doesn’t stop me from constantly fretting about it in front of them. T ate everything until he was 2.5, and then gradually retreated into a bland carbohydrate diet. J is somewhat better, but his need to “have what T is having” doesn’t help.
My dad used to tell the story of how in his family he had to eat everything on his plate. One night he sat there, not eating his (disgusting) veges. When everyone else left the table , he got up and (secretly, he thought) threw his food out into the yard. His mum scraped it back onto his plate, and he had to eat it, dirt and all.
I remember my childhood meals of meat and three veg. I literally gagged at the prospect of eating boiled peas and I pushed them around the plate trying to make the pile look smaller.
Given that P and I (now) eat a lot of veges, and they are always available, I just hope that eventually the kids will gravitate to a healthful diet. T “knows” what a healthful diet is, and will often say he would like veges for dinner (to watch my face glow with happiness) but when they are served, his face crumples in despair. “If only they tasted nice mum!” He happily eats avocadoes, carrots, the peas shelled from fresh snow peas, and will nibble on a leaf. Sigh.
Recent reading on kids’ health threw up the finding that parents are poor judges of how healthy their kids are, as they confuse happiness and healthiness. So even though we might *know* our kids’ diet is inadequate, or they have too little exercise or too much screen time, we *think* we are getting away with it: “Look, they’re healthy!” when in actual fact they’re ‘just’ happy.
Another snippet from the same book. In the UK, school canteens are shifting to ‘healthy’ menus (thank you Jamie). At one school, an entrepreneurial 13yo opened a rival canteen, selling the stuff that the school canteen used to sell. He was doing very well, and his customers included the teaching staff, when the school closed him down as he was ‘undermining their healthy eating message’. He was pissed off – he wasn’t doing anything illegal.
I like this story as I can’t decide what I think. Obviously I am committed to the “healthy eating message”, but I *really* feel for this kid! The injustice! I take it they didn’t close down the local Maccas as it was ‘undermining the healthy eating message’. The most amazing learning experience he probably ever had on those premises, and just shut down. What’s he learnt now? – the little guy can’t win.
Sorry to bore those of you who have heard my experience of being arbitrarily “shut down” by school authorities because my activities didn’t suit them, but I can *still* seethe with the injustice of it! In primary school, when I was in Year 6, the school decided that girls were not allowed on the school oval to play during lunch and recess (yes, the 1980’s – not quite the dark ages). A friend and I started “Girls Lib”, a movement to allow girls back on to the oval. Our initiatives included large posters advertising all the games girls used to enjoy on the oval, and a petition. When you signed the petition, you receive an handmade badge – “Girls Lib!” Unfortunately, the boys took this as some sort of gender war, and started ripping them off girls’ shirts – meaning my friend and I were in full scale production of the badges, to replace those lost to the neanderthal boys.
The librarian asked us to move the petition out of the library, so we relocated to near the canteen. Then after a week or so, my classroom teacher advised that the principal had advised him that we had to stop Girls Lib, because it was too disruptive. No boy was advised that they should stop grabbing at girls tops and ripping off their badge. We still weren’t allowed on the oval. CAN YOU BELIEVE THAT???????? Not a single teacher – or parent – including my own – was prepared to step up and support our cause. Just shut down for causing a disturbance. That was the high & low point of my career as an activist. A just cause, and no one in authority cared about anything, except the quiet life. Maybe it was at this point that I decided that school was a series of lessons in compliance and control. He’s probably dead now, but the principal’s name was Mr Colvin, and unfortunately I have never bumped into him as an adult to give him the serve that ALL THE OTHER ADULTS SHOULD HAVE AT THE TIME. GGGRRRRRRR.
I was a bit uncertain about the wwoofing thing. I mean, I liked the concept, but being an introvert I was out of my comfort zone. When we first arrived I felt like a fish out of water (I wanted to run), and I was *astonished* to find that there were already 3 wwoofers here! I thought they’d never get anyone! This is probably the best thing we’ve done so far. Mainly due to the fantastic people here, who were incredibly welcoming – and interesting. It’s sort of a spiritual relief to hang out with people whose life is very different to your own. The Aboriginal overseer and his French girlfriend. The unhappily retired diesel fitter who found solace travelling around outback stations working on vehicles for board and fuel. The guy who traps feral dogs for a living. (FYI, there are 20 dogger zones in WA and there are vacancies. Wage: $325 a day, aiming to get one dog a day. Contact the WA Department of Agriculture). 
