Guess What We had for Breakfast

Following the tone of the 'I'd Never' blog from last week, I just had to take a quick second to comment on our breakfast this morning here at Casa de Dahlby.

Lucky Charms.

I threw in a banana for good measure, but Meg totally downed herself a bowl of marshmallow sugary goodness prior to the piece of fruit. Lucky Charms. I swore I would never cower to the cereal giants . . . who advertise their wretched products on children's TV so that they can capture their perfect (and perfectly impressionable) clientele. But cower I have . . . I've totally fallen victim to yet another thing I said I would never do: sugary cereals.

I can blame Jim for this -- and Jim, you know it's true. He brought home a box of Fruit Loops with marshmallows a few weeks ago, and we've only gone down hill from there. Meg LOVED the cereal, calling it 'Fruit Loops with Hearts' and asking for it each and every morning. Fruit Loops -- sugar coated cereal in itself -- with marshmallows . . . who knew such candy even existed for breakfast?!

Horrified, I poured her bowl after bowl of the Fruit Loops . . . always offering fruit in the hopes that it would somehow create that 'balanced breakfast' the cereal claims to be such a part of. I felt terrible for giving her such crap.

Then I told my dad all about it. You see, he loves to give Meg treats when she's at his house, I just couldn't resist letting him in on her newest favorite . . . just in case he wanted to get her a treat for her next visit. I was thinking maybe we could pass the Fruit Loops off as something that is done at Grandaddy's, not at home . . . and then my dad said something that kinda struck a chord with me.

"I just can't believe I'm feeding her this sugary cereal. She can't be getting any kind of nutrition from it at all . . ." said me, the worried Mom.

"Oh, relax. Let her have it. You are only a kid once, you know," said Grandaddy.

I thought about that. You are only a kid once. That's so true. I don't want to deprive her of some of those kid-things, things you only do when you are young. There is such a small period of time when these little things -- like Lucky Charms -- are a real treat. I thought that my dad's opinion made sense . . . I won't give sugary cereal to her all the time, but every once is a while, some sugary stuff makes being a kid that much more special. I just need to relax. She is only a kid once.

Today, Meg had Lucky Charms, and I didn't worry too much. I actually poured myself a bowl and ate Lucky Charms with her. She got a BIG kick out of that, and so did I. For a few moments this morning, I was a kid again. So we didn't get any nutirional value from our breakfast . . . we both smiled a lot, and that has quite a bit of value to me.