One of the disciplines I instilled in them was to give them a saving target - either an item they wanted to buy or an amount (say $20 for an 8 year old). I also for a while insisted that they save half of their allowance while free to spend the remainder as soon as they wanted (= immediately).

But I saw this video today and wondered if this might’ve  helped if only I’d seen it five years ago…

(Loosely) Related Posts:

• Age Appropriate Jobs for Kids
• What Would MacGyver Do?
• New Dads

[shudder]

The Australian Institute of Health and Welfare’s snapshot of Australian children released today shows the level of disdain children have for their greens.

The report, A Picture of Australian Children 2009, citing a 2007 nutrition survey, says: “Only a very small proportion of children met the recommendations for daily serves of vegetables (excluding potatoes) - 3 per cent of 4- to 8-year-olds and 2 per cent of 9- to 13-year-olds.

“Even with the inclusion of potatoes, the proportions remained low (22 per cent and 14per cent respectively).

National Health and Medical Research Council guidelines recommend one serve of fruit and two serves of vegetables a day for children aged four to seven, one serve of fruit and three serves of vegetables for those eight to 11, and three serves of fruit and four serves of vegetables for ages 12 to 18. A serve is about half a cup.

[sigh]. When this Gen X Dad was a lad himself, he hated peas. Hated them. Vile things they were and still are.

And you know what else? I ate them. At least 4 times a week. Along with home-made vegetable soups and other attrocities forced on me by my abusive mother. My horrible mother who wouldn’t bow to my pleas for mercy , who refused to take into account the quite sensible argument that vegetables (peas especially) ‘taste yukky’.

I mean, really! If something tastes bad, you shouldn’t be forced to eat it just because it’s good for you. I just don’t understand why she was so cruel that she couldn’t just let me survive on bread, meat, cheese, peanut butter and confectionary.

…or at least I didn’t understand until I actually grew up (somewhere around the age 30 when my first son was born, coincidentally). Suddenly I realised that I was responsible for the health of someone else. That I had to start from scratch in training them to look after themselves. And that I was not always going to be popular with them for doing so…

I must admit that we have fought an almost daily war in our house for about 6 years now. It’s not the war on terror or the war on drugs. It’s simply the war to get our youngest son to eat enough fruit and veg. For some reason, Eldest Son took to them fine and eats a very balanced diet. Whatever we did with him worked. For that and other reasons, he is an exceptionally healthy young man.

Youngest Son - on the other hand - often has tummy problems and does everything he can to avoid eating food that’s green/yellow/red unless it’s that color because of food colorings.

And tho’ we’ve not won every battle, we fight on. We endure his wrath. We stand up to him. We unfortunately find ourselves entering into painful negotiations which we feel like we shouldn’t (but we still do) … anything to get some healthy food in his gut.

At the age my kids are now, Eldest Son sounds like he’s part of the 2 % of kids in the study above, while Youngest is probably part of the other 98. It pains me to say that; I feel like my track record is only 50/50. But as I said, we persist with him.

Tell me your experiences of this. Tell me what you think about this. Generally speaking, as far as I can tell it’s not kids’ attitude to vegies that’s changed, but parents’ attitudes to being assertive. Or is it? I have to take a good hard look at myself if that is the case…

What is is about Gen Z kids and their Gen X parents that stop them from actually eating what they need to? And apart from obvious solutions like hiding vegies in pasta sauces and putting lots of icecream on fruit, what else have you done to help your kids get enough fruit and veg?

[By the way, you could take a leaf out of this blogger's cabbage book and try the ideas at Alternative Vegetable Names]

So…

Happy Father’s Day to all the dads I know around the world and all the Dads who secretly read this blog and whom I don’t know!!

Take stock today, remember your victories, your successes, your accomplishments as Dad. Revive your hobbies and interests. Be kind to yourself and smell a rose or two.

Your kids need you. And they’re lucky to have you.

Three years ago, in a living room far far away, I was talking with my then six year old son about the way water looks different on clear days and cloudy days.

I told  the lad (pictured above at around that time in history) that water looked better on nice blue-sky days. He replied that all days are nice days - “the blue days and the silver days.”

“Silver days? What’s a silver day?” I asked.

“A silver day. You know, when it’s raining.”

Isn’t that an interesting perspective? I’ve long known that children are smarter than adults. And this proved it again. The days that we adults commonly label as grey days, gloomy days, cloudy days – a child might see these as silver.

Silver has value. Silver is attractive. We talk about clouds having a silver lining.

So are you having a gray day? Why is it so gray? What’s the flip side? What’s the benefit of the rain that’s falling? Where’s the opportunity in your struggle? What are the things that you can be thankful for?

Here’s hoping that all your days are either blue or silver…