Waste Not, Want Not

Ok, how many of you Mommies out there eat like, six meals and four snacks a day?  

Come on… you eat your own meals, that’s a given.   Then you end up feeding your kids on their own schedule, where who can help but pop a bite or two in your own mouth while you’re fixing it?   Then the dreaded moment when your kid is clearly, “All Done!” and something kicks in your psyche that is your own Mommy’s voice talking about not throwing away food because there are starving children out there in third world countries.    So rather than throw away the smashed bits of toast or waffles or string cheese, rather than toss those picked-over chicken tenders  to the dog and begin an irreparable habit with your four-legged beast, you instead shove those cold and slightly mushy morsels  into your own mouth without thinking?   Not the already chewed bites, but the perfectly edible, yet too small to save  pieces that your little angel passed up with no more than a squish with his pointer finger.

Now I’m a very physically active, still fairly svelt thirty-something Mom, but even I can see that this multi-meal habit has got to stop.   Kenny is a great eater, but he leaves  at least  a tablespoon or two of food on his tray at the “I’m finished now, my lovely Mommy” signal.   And try as I might to toss the crumbs, I’m caught in a generations-old guilt cycle of not letting good food go to waste.   Today, not counting my real meals, I’ve consumed half a toaster waffle, two different half-eaten apples, most of a polly-o string cheese, four crackers (in pieces), a scrambled egg,  and at least a bowls-worth of Cheerios.   Oh, and there was the rest of the chicken from a  deli-sandwich somewhere in there that I thought Kenny ate, but found instead in the creases of his pants when I picked him up out of the highchair.

What’s a Mom to do?   Do I just close my eyes, hold my breath and throw it down the disposal?   Do I recycle it into compost for my tulip garden?   Do I wrap it in sheets of plastic wrap and convince myself that Kenny will eat it later?

My hips are on the line here, my sisters.   Somebody talk some sense into me!