Sports Treats and the Junior Varsity Mom

Sports treats confuse me.  Any time my my children have sporting events, I make sure they eat breakfast or lunch or have a snack in plenty of time before the event so they have fuel, and are not sick during the activity. I don't know if my parents did the same thing for me, but we did have family meals. I don't remember going hungry. I don't remember ever having snacks after games.  I do remember one end of the season party when we won the league that included a family picnic.

Today, if you live in the Pacific Northwest, if your child plays soccer, and mine both do, parents sign up to bring post-game snacks. Parents arrive with Costco size boxes of granola bars, fruit snacks and cases of Capri-Sun or Gatorade to share after each game. I always sign up and I always scramble to bring something that my kid and other kids will eat.  Because I'm a Junior Varsity Mom, I don't always remember that it is my snack day until I see the team that plays before us snacking away as my child's team warms up.  Let me be honest, because I'm a JV Mom, I don't always deliver my child to the right play field.

If both my husband and I are at the game, and I've forgotten my snack commitment, one of us sneaks away and comes back with the treats. Problem solved.  Last fall, while my husband was in the Midwest spending some quality time with his parents, I had snack duty. When I realized that, though I had my child to her game on-time, I would soon be in trouble because I was snack-less, I was in a bit of a pinch. I weighed my options. Could I leave my son at the game with his friends and their parents while I ran to the grocery store? Would my daughter be distracted if she noticed I wasn't watching from the sidelines while I was gathering treats?

Then, wonder of wonders, my friend Leah was on the sidelines. Because she is amazing, she contacted me every other Wednesday last fall to see if I wanted to order a case of apples. The apples she orders are organic, and half the price of grocery store apples. We eat them up. Leah, whose daughter would play after mine was done, was at the field and she had my case apples in her car.

These are the actual apples--organic Honey Crisp.

She and I conferred about whether the apples would be snack enough. She assured me they would be. No drink, no sugar, no cracker crunch. I remembered my mother giving out apples and bananas, much to my horror, on Halloween and this snack seemed akin my mom's treats/tricks (you can decide how you feel about them).  Leah convinced me that my apples would be great, and if I offered them to the parents, I might just look like I had arrived prepared for this snack situation. She was onto something there.

"Honeycrisp?" Parents asked.
"Caviar of apples!" They said.

I encouraged people to take an extra apple--why not? I would have easily spent the same amount of money on crappy fruit snacks, fishy crackers and Gatorade.

"Saved by Leah," I thought.

If you think you can lobby with your team parents to do away with post game snacks because you fed your child before the game and intend to feed her a meal after the game, please give it a try.  I'm not sure the kids need a snack after each physical activity.

If you're not brave enough to broach the subject, or don't think lobbying would be successful, I encourage you to get a friend like Leah, who might have a case of apples that she picked up for you in her car just when you need them.  Or begin keeping bags of apples or oranges in your trunk for such snack emergencies.

I hear you.  C'mon Heather, mark your calendar, put an alert in your phone, and be an organized adult.  That is a viable option, too, if you're Varsity.  When you're a JV Mom, sometimes you scramble. Sometimes you lean on your friends. After enough failures, you might start using your calendar. I'll let you know how those alerts work out this spring soccer season. I'm sure they are amazingly helpful if a person remembers to set them. Details. . .