Confession time.
I saw this image in my FB feed five seconds ago, and I got excited. "That's so cute! I want to try that." And then, point five seconds later I also thought, "What the hell am I thinking?"
And even right now, as I type this, I can't decide if making peanut-butter-snail snacks for your kids is a great idea or yet another example of how we are constantly over-the-top-parenting-the-shit-out-of-everything. Even snack-time (no offence, cute peanut butter snail snack. It's not you. You're just the catalyst for this whole conversation.)
On one hand this is a creative way to get your kids to eat healthy snacks. (Double points there in my books: creativity AND health)
But on the other hand this is just another example of how we are adding more stress to ours lives as parents, whether we realize it or not. Can't anything be simple anymore? What happened to calling it a "squirrels tail" and just slapping some PB on a banana and saying "here you go kid!"
SIDE NOTE: My Dad used to say to me, "Put peanut-butter on your lips and go out for Halloween as an asshole." That was the extent of his creative involvement. I know it's a little off topic, but it does involve peanut-butter.
But seriously though, have you ever thought about how a simple image of a peanut-butter-snail-snack could entirely ruin someone's day? Or maybe even their whole life?
Picture an exhausted, dedicated, hard-working, loving parent (aka: you). You're trying desperately to do the best you can. You've just made it home after a long day, you're scrolling through your social media channels and...BOOM! You see the peanut butter snail snack. And that's when you break. You think,
"F*CK! Is THIS what people are doing for lunches now? Is THIS really a THING? That's it. I'm a failure. If other parents are finding the time do this (and take pictures of it. And share it) then surely, I'm failing at this whole parenting thing, and I might as well just throw in the towel. It's alphagetti for dinner kids. And you can open your own damn can."
You flop lifelessly onto the couch, and decide to call it quits.
All of your years of careful parenting efforts end here.
You start smoking. Inside. You start swearing in front of your kids. F-bombs in every sentence. You un-buckle those rear-facing car seats. In fact...you turn them around. Or throw them out completely! You decide, "why not bring back spanking too, while you're at it?!?" Who cares? Not you. Not anymore.
Once upon a time, you did care. Until you felt utterly deflated as a parent because somehow you didn't get the memo that lunches needed to be great works of art. I guess you were too busy worrying about positive discipline, and attachment parenting. F*ck that shit. That was the old you. Thanks to Peanut Butter Snail Snack, you've changed your whole parenting game.
It's time to kick things old-school.
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