Lunch Box Love Notes

When Will started Kindergarten and Soph first, I decided to put little notes in their lunches occasionally. Originally my goal was once a week, and I maintained for a while, using nap time to create fun little paper pictures to surprise them with.  It didn't take too long to taper off to once a month.

This was my first. A fox for Sophie.

His tail swishes so you can read the message

Now I make them for all three kids.  Sometimes, they are super complex and meaningful and other times they are just a paper heart with a note.  

Will's First day at Magellan School

A super quick and easy one (read: last minute)

I have even been known, (after discrete hinting and permission from the artist) to use one of the kids' drawings to create notes.

This is Ruby's.  She made the witch, I added the message.

I have made a bunch of these, and the kids always enjoy them.  I expected them to be ruined, stained with food, manhandled by friends or even tossed out.  But they always come home.  I've been saving them for years now, I have a big box that is completely full.  Every once in a while, the girls will thumb through them.

We've moved twice in the past 6 months and it occurred to me that I should go back and photograph them all, just in case.  So they are all here now, not in the right order, I couldn't ever remember that.

Treat Thursday!

Seven years ago, when my oldest started Kindergarten, (and I was stupid and idealistic) she made it all of 3 days before she began begging for cookies in her lunch, "like the other kids have."

I was not going to put cookies in her no-waste, farm-to-table, meticulously planned bento box lunch. Good mothers just don't do such things.

But here's the rub, I love her.  And I get it, everyone else around you has something you think is wonderful and you feel deprived... And I love treats, no surprise.

So, after several weeks of being pestered, I made her a deal.  Once a week, I will put a treat in your lunchbox.  What day do you want it?

"Thursdays"

She answered with no hesitation, "Thursdays are the worst day of the week."

And so, every Thursday since then, the kids have gotten a treat in their lunch boxes.

Interestingly, several years later, I was relaying this story of why, once a week, Ruby was getting a treat in her lunch to her kindergarten teacher, and Jane very quickly confirmed that Thursday is, in fact, the worst day of the week for most kids.  Past the novelty of a new week, but not actually the end.