How to regulate food

12 years ago

Ok.... this has to do with my own ds16. He's as thin as a rail.... 6'2" ish and 144 lbs. When I buy snacks and stuff I can't keep them around for the other three kids for nothing. My dh just found TONS of wrappers from granola bars and fruit snacks, a big jar of peanut butter, 2 bowls and 2 cups under his bed. He sneaks them cause I don't allow them to eat in their rooms. I've yelled at him before pretty hardcore. I don't know what else to do. I have to monitor my ds11 food intake cause he's chunky... but this one isn't.... I just can't afford to keep buying these snacks. DH is livid. Anybody have any suggestions?

Comments (5)

incognitomom
12 years ago
We have gone through this with my ss. He is thin as a rail also, he would pick at meals and sneak snacks into his room in the middle of the night!

We have had to force him to eat all his meals and we grounded him from any snacks (besides fruit in between meals) for weeks. We have hidden snacks. We have talked to him, yelled at him, and grounded him from video games for sneaking snacks.

It has finally stopped. But it was a miserable process!! I posted on here about it too and lots of people suggested buying no snacks for our house, but I just did not find that idea reasonable for our family. It probably would have made things easier though!
Amber3902
12 years ago
My suggestion is putting a lock on the pantry door.
Related Discussions
food food food
Q
Comments (33)
Here ya go Florey! It was on page 4 I believe. While I'm at it I'll post my vegetarian recipe for chili. It's easily made with meat by starting with browning ground meat or other meat then going from there with this recipe. Saute about 3 cups each of onion, celery and peppers of your choice and two Tablespoons or more of garlic[ I use about 3 or 4 for this amount, smiles]. When these are sauteed a bit, add two cups of carrots and 2 large cans of small diced tomatoes [with their juice]. I don't like to use crushed or sauce in my chili. I think it overwhelms the veggies. A bay leaf and couple tablespoons each of cumin, chili powder, and salt. Add water or veggie stock, if needed, to bring level up to slightly above veggies. As hard veggies begin to soften, add 2 cups each of eggplant[cubed], zucchini and/or yellow squash. Cook another ten minutes and add 2 cups each mushrooms, canned or frozen corn and canned or frozen green beans. Taste now for salt and seasonings and adjust. Next add as many beans as you like. I use the liquid in the beans too. At least 1 lrg can of dark and 1 lrg can of light kidney beans. Also, black beans and cannellini beans are good. Pintos are great too, naturally. As soon as beans are heated through the chili is done. Taste once more for seasoning. Like all chili this is best if made the day before. Does great frozen. I usually make about 3 gallons of this at a time and freeze in 4 or 5 containers.
...See More
How to regulate Temp For Tomato
Q
Comments (3)
Think of dirt farming! The soil temperature, except for the very top, varies little from day to night. But the air temperature does. Some evenings it may not drop under 70 in the dead of summer, other evenings it may be anywhere from the low 50s to mid-60s. So if your room gets into the low 80s during the afternoon and cools a bit at night, you'll be mimicking the outdoors. But there is also lots of air movement outside, so be sure you have a fan blowing on the plants for a while each day. And of course, there is the lighting issue and the birds and bees thing. Presuming you have enough lights - the sun provides about 65,000 lumens on a partially overcast day - you can gently shake the plants once blooms appear. Most places say you should do this between 9-11 am. Others have also used a hand massager to stimulate the plants and help pollinate the flowers. I'm trying to grow Siletz because it is parthenocarpic. Mike
...See More
How much food is too much food?
Q
Comments (4)
In the interest of redundancy, here it is again: With horse manure it is almost impossible to give them too much. Let the cow manure pre-compost, and it is almost impossible to give them too much. When we talk about too much food, we are usually talking about kitchen scraps. Too much food in the form of kitchen scraps will create a pretty yucky environment. The moisture in the food will cause the bin to go anaerobic, and the high nitrogen will throw off the bin's environment. Whatever you feed them, worms will consume about half their body weight each day. Under good conditions, they will eat their own body weight each day. Too much food is simply more than they can eat. Another factor that determines over feeding is the tendency of the food to heat up as it is breaking down. Both horse and cow manure can heat up quite a bit. If they have been aged to the point where they will no longer heat up, you won't have this problem. Any food you put in the bin should be totally consumed by the worms in about a week. Additional food can be added before that to give it a chance to break down before the worms attack it. You are feeding too much if it is not all consumed within a week. So our rule of thumb is to add about 1/2 pound of food for each pound of worms per day. You don't need to feed every day. You could feed 2 pounds of food for each pound of worms every fourth day. Then watch to see how fast the worms eat it and adjust the amount you feed accordingly. Aged horse manure is an ideal worm food. I would add about a pound of horse manure for each pound of worms and see how fast they eat it. You won't need bedding. Your only concern is for over heating. With cow manure, you will need some bedding. I would add about a pound of aged cow manure plus bedding for each pound of worms and see how fast they eat it. Feeding is as much an art as it is a science. In time you will figure it out. If you are feeding aged horse manure, or even small amounts of fresh manure, it is hard to make any big mistakes. You could fill your entire bin with aged horse manure, and your worms will be very happy. Weighing food isn't practical, and weighing your worms is nearly impossible, so add no more than an inch of aged manure over the top of the bin and see what happens. If the manure is still fresh, only cover half of the bin surface. That way, if the manure gets hot, the worms can escape to the other side of the bin. In a few days it will cool off, and the worms will be all over it. Really. Worms devouring horse manure is a sight to see. Your bin will be less than 8 inches deep, so this is what I would do. If the manure is well aged, fill the entire bin with horse manure, and feed enough to keep the depth between 6 and 8 inches. If you are feeding cow manure, you will need a bedding source as well. If there is any question as to whether the manure has aged enough, fill the bin with some form of bedding, and feed enough manure on the top to keep the depth between 6 and 8 inches, only feeding half of the bin surface at a time. If the manure is fresh, you could start with a mixture of manure and bedding and let the bin sit for a couple of weeks before adding worms. After a couple of weeks, turn the whole thing and make sure it does not heat up. If it does heat up, wait another week and try again. This is getting long. Time to post it. If I missed anything, someone else will fill in the holes.
...See More
How To I.D. Genetically Modified Food at the Supermarket
Q
Comments (17)
I think the term "GMO" is very misleading, since it stands for "genetically modified organism." As Momj47 points out, we've been genetically modifying our food, ourselves and whatever else we can get our hands on for eons, via selective breeding, and more recently all kinds of hybridizations and other techniques, etc. While some folks get all in a tither about "frankenfoods" they are just skimming the surface of the hype. The big issue really is not whether we should genetically modify organisms, but HOW we are doing it, the rate we are doing it at, and WHAT TYPES of genetic modifications we are doing and their implications, and the paucity of research into long term consequences and minimal oversight that goes into the process. The biggest use of "GMO" is not fruits and vegetables in general, but rather potatoes, corn and soybeans that are being bred to have pesticides (Bt) in their tissues, and to be resistant to herbicide (Roundup). Those are the main genetic manipulations that are causing all the hoopla, and you're not going to get a little code on your corn chips, tofu, products with soybean oil, corn syrup, etc. in them. In fact, there is no government regulation for labeling GMO corn and soy. They are becoming so ubiquitous that it is near impossible, so the industry mantra goes. Some companies label their foods, "non-GMO" I've seen that on corn chips and tofu in the health food stores, but you are having to rely on the word of the purveyor. The competition argues that this is meaningless since the genes of corn and soybeans with Bt and insecticide resistence are spreading throughout the fields and into ones that are supposedly GMO free. Plants are INCREDIBLY promiscuous! Here is a link that might be useful: GMO issues explained by Univ. Kentucky College of Agriculture
...See More
imamommy
12 years ago
He's 16. Have him get a part time/summer job & buy his own snacks. With a lot of kids, it might be more fair to buy containers... I use mini stackable bins. When you buy boxed snacks... divy them up. When their bin is empty,, they are done. That is the fair way but when my boys were teens... one was thin, the other not... it was tough. The thin one had a better metabolism & was more active... and probably needed more calories too because he burned more off.

But, 16 is a good age to give him some personal responsibility... he can make a little spending money by mowing lawns or a part time job.
justmetoo
12 years ago
--"He's 16. Have him get a part time/summer job & buy his own snacks"--

LOL. That's exactly waht I thought. My own youngest son worked fulltime from 16 on. You can't treat a 16 yr old like a young child or even like he were 12ish.

However, one dish found in room would be a violation of house rules. Seriously, at 16 wrappers are a childish no-no. Dirty dishes in bedroom, again childish no-no. If the kid wants special treatment (he's older and you can't treat a 16 yt old like the 10 yr old) than it's time he act his age. If he wants to treat his parent/SF with disrespect, nope, no snacks in room. If he wants to treat his parent/SF with the respect that goes along with being older and abides house rules and special privileges, rethink the 'no bedroom rule' for him.

My at time 16 yr old would always bring down any dishes and also all garbage. He might get away with leaving a granola bar wrapper in trash can for a few days (when he normally would empty it) but he never tossed banana peels, orange peels, half eaten slices of pizza blah blah in there.

By the time my youngest son was 18 he had his own section of the fridge and his own section in freezer. I have not purchased groceries for him since about the time he started working. He of course could eat what I did have or what we were eating but he preferred buying his own. He would keep his non-perishables in a tote in his room. He was not allowed to eat snacks in front of younger daughter. If he did he had to share with her. If he brought home a pizza take-out at 9pm in evening to eat while he watched tv in his room he had several 'rules' 1)must eat at desk in room 2)bring down any wrappers/dishes 3) cut off a tiny slice if DD was still up to 'share' a bite with her. (A tiny bite would be enough, she was not hungry or needing a snack anyway)

He also did not like the diet soda so if he bought in cases of pop, those too had to be in his room. If he drank soda downstairs when daughter was home he had to drink my soda in front of her.

Have SF sit him down guy to guy and talk about getting older, being treated a bit 'older' than the other kids, house rules, and coming to agreements on what and how it could/would mean. Abuses result back to being treated like the younger children. Let the two of them work it out...SF won't be the 'Mom' harping at kid, it'll be two guys coming to terms on how 'guys' act when they act to mature and the privileges that can mean (or not if they still act like little boys).

I think sometimes it's too easy to forget that our children are growing up when we have a house full of kids, especially younger kids with different ages.
momof3_stepof1
Original Author
12 years ago
I'd LOVE to put a lock on my pantry door... my dh has a disorder that makes him sleep eat. Anyway, I like the idea of bins and separating the snacks.

He just got a temporary job last week. It was 2 days last week and 3 this week. (He officially turned 16 on the 4th of July) He has already applied online at a few places but it takes a little bit of time. We told him he had to get a job because I am not going to continue to pay for his cell phone now (I'll give him a few months).... just a way to show him some responsibility. I also refuse to buy him a car, so he'll have to save for that.

I also like the idea of him and my dh sitting down and chatting, though my dh is a stubborn mule sometimes and I don't know if he'll do it or not. We will see. Thanks for the suggestions everyone!

How to regulate food

Comments (5)

incognitomom

Amber3902

Related Discussions

imamommy

justmetoo

momof3_stepof1
Original Author

COMPANY

BUSINESS SERVICES

GET HELP

CONNECT WITH US

How to regulate food

Comments (5)

incognitomom

Amber3902

Related Discussions

imamommy

justmetoo

momof3_stepof1Original Author

COMPANY

BUSINESS SERVICES

GET HELP

CONNECT WITH US

momof3_stepof1
Original Author