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snacks, toddlers, and no-longer-indulgent mothers.

April 27th, 2006 at 02:08 am

My son is a picky eater. There. I admitted it. And when it comes to snacks, he's even pickier. Only animal crackers will do.

So, I had developed a habit of buying him a small one-to-two-serving box of animal crackers every time we were at the store, be it the drugstore, the grocery store, the big-box general store, or anywhere they had that cute little red box with the circus animals on the side and the white string across the top. At $1-$1.50 a pop, it seemed like a sweet indulgence for my adorable boy.

But $1.50 a pop, multiplied out by three times a week, four weeks a month, twelve months a year, that's quite a lot for cookies. Even if the box is cute and a semi-appropriate serving size for the boy.

Enter logic. The store brand box at my local grocery is $0.99 for at least a dozen servings, and I already had the re-usable plastic containers. I bought the store brand, and when I got it home I pre-divided it into toddler-sized portions. Half the portions made it to the car for distribution before entering a store, and half stayed in the kitchen cabinet for further dispersal.

Twelve servings of cute red-box-with-circus-animals animal crackers = $18.

Twelve servings of store-brand animal crackers in plastic reusable containers = $1.

A toddler who doesn't know the difference? Priceless.