Ham, Ham, Ham

We hosted Christmas dinner yesterday afternoon (my old parents - I'm my mom's caregiver and live with them) my sister and her husband and their 13 year old son.

We had a large ham - and so half of it is left. My dad has already cut it up into thick slices - we have enough slices for breakfast, lunch and dinner for today and tomorrow.

Which is too bad, because ham isn't my favorite food. Nevertheless, I shall eat it.

One of the reasons why we have so much ham is because my nephew barely ate anything. As is his custom, he snacked before he came, ruining his appetite for the meal. This is not so bad when he's coming over to someone's house, but when he does it before going out to a restaurant, it does get annoying. The more so because of course he will either order a large meal, or fill his plate full if it's a Chinese restaurant, and then eat a couple of bites. The rest of the food, and the money his parents have to spend to pay for it, are wasted.

He's done this often enough now that I've come to expect it, but either his parents haven't cottoned on to it.... or they just don't care.

I think it's that they don't care. Whatever makes their young son happy, why, that's completely okay.

I know this because last night, my sister told us (she was seated next to me and her son at the time), that she was going to church today, and did he want to come. He of course said no. I teased him about having gone to a religious school when he was a very young kid, and he said that he had found it boring. And his mom had said, "Oh, I'm sorry."

Apologizing to him for the fact that 7 years ago, when he was 6, she'd made him go to a school that he'd found boring!

She does that a lot, my sister. On the previous times when he's filled his plate and not eaten anything, she'll say, "Oh, that's okay."

We can be playing scrabble (okay, his dad will tell him to do things he doesn't want to do, like play a game of scrabble with his mother, aunt and grandmother - but I guess the dad can't make him do it with a good grace) and he can be tapping his fingers incessantly, acting bored, playing 3-letter words, and his mom won't say anything.

(However, it would not surprise me if all he can spell are three-letter words. He's not a big reader...)

But back to the food thing.

It turns out - me deducing from what I heard - is that the parents and the kid don't have a set breakfast or lunch time. The only time they get together for a meal is for dinner. At all other times they just go and get food whenever they want, and so the boy snacks all day long. If he had a slow metabolism instead of a fast metabolism he'd be extremely tubby right now, but he does have a fast metabolism, so he eats all day - expect for dinner - and never learns to do otherwise.

All this rant is a long way of saying that yes - it is important to instill good eating habits in kids. Have, if at all possible, a set time for breakfast, lunch and dinner and don't let him stuff himself (or herself) in between! Teach kids that wasting food is wasting food and money!

Well, on a lighter note...its the day after Christmas. 6 more days until a new year, January 1.

Are you one of those many folks who don't start anything new until the new year, and then make your New Years Resolutions?

Well...for you to keep your New Year's Resolutions, you've got to start preparing to do so now.

More on that in tomorrow's post.