Special Meals for the Last Day of Summer and First Day of School??? About This Page:

[Chrissi]

My mom did this when I was a kid. I thought it would be fun, but I'm not brave enough to make my mom's chocolate-chocolate chip cheesecake. That was always my choice for dessert the night before the first day of school.

I plan all of our meals a month in advance to make the best use of specials, leftovers, and freezer space and I'm a bit behind planning for September due to our vacation coming up. My plan for the last day of summer vacation is Mac & Cheese Casserole and Chocolate Fondue with Fruit and Spongecake. I don't know what I want to make for dinner the first day of school, however. Any ideas? Do you do anything special for either of those meals?

Just to give you an idea of what's on the menu after that - the rest of the week, my guys are having grilled cheese and tomato soup, freezer pizza with salad, minestrone (with beef tortellini) and cantaloupe, and leftovers. The following week, it's pot roast with rolls, veggies, and baked apples, BLTA croissant sammies and sweet tater fries, leftovers, beef chili, and chili casserole. (I don't have anything for the last 2 days of that week yet. Lazy. )

[stretch2864]

Does D.J. have any favorite foods? Maybe he could plan the first day of school menu.

[Chrissi]

Originally Posted by stretch2864

Does D.J. have any favorite foods? Maybe he could plan the first day of school menu.

That was the original plan. His idea of dinner and mine are drastically different. His favorite food is PB&J. (He wanted to have PB&J, cotton candy, and chocolate milk. Can't fault him for trying. ) And if it's a fried nugget of some sort, DJ will eat it. Problem is, DH and I can't handle fried food overly much and I just can't choke down the oven-fried tofu or catfish nuggets that I make for him. He loves them, but they make me turn green.

I was hoping to come up with a list of suggestions that he could choose from to avoid the inclusion of things like cotton candy the next time I ask him.

[stretch2864]

Originally Posted by Chrissi

That was the original plan. His idea of dinner and mine are drastically different. His favorite food is PB&J. (He wanted to have PB&J, cotton candy, and chocolate milk. Can't fault him for trying. ) And if it's a fried nugget of some sort, DJ will eat it. Problem is, DH and I can't handle fried food overly much and I just can't choke down the oven-fried tofu or catfish nuggets that I make for him. He loves them, but they make me turn green.

I was hoping to come up with a list of suggestions that he could choose from to avoid the inclusion of things like cotton candy the next time I ask him.

I like the way his mind works! I never would have thought to include cotton candy in a meal!

When my DD was younger, we used to do fun things with regular foods. I would make pasta of some sort and arrange it on the plate for hair. Then we would make chicken breasts or chicken patties and cut them up into shapes for the eyes and nose. Finally we would fix a veggie like peas or corn and fashion a serving into a smile on the bottom. Then there is always the hot dog which is left intact on one half and then cut into 8 attached even sections on the other half. Leave the intact section on top and decorate it with ketchup eyes and a mouth. Voila....an instant octapus dinner! We also made the jello aquarium one year. It looked really cool, but tasted terrible! In a glass bowl, I mixed together blue raspberry jello (or something that looked blue). As it was setting we dumped in a bunch of gummy fish. When it was done it looked like an edible aquarium. The problem is that the gummy fish start disintegrating into the jello, so that the whole thing doesn't taste very good! I hope you figure out something fun for dinner that night!

[krisk11]

My dd wants Toaster Strudles for breakfast the first day of school so I'll buy them as a treat since they are pretty expensive so I don't normally buy them. I also try to get good stuff for in her lunch. Dinner we don't really worry about.

[Teresa]

Alphabet soup, or A to Z dinner. Like - Applesauce, Ambrosia salad, some sort of meat, Zucchini, zebra cakes.

[Tink and co.]

Personally, I see no problems with DJs menu selections. Sounds like a wonderful meal!

We don't really do anything special, as we start on different days. I do try to buy their favorites for lunches and breakfasts that first week. For Jack's first week, he wanted Salami and lettuce sandwiches for lunch and mini pancakes (from a box!) for breakfast.

[lukeandbrookesmom]

The last breakfast before school starts for us is 'whatever' they want. And I mean, whatever. If they want a KitKat, that's what they get Nine times out of ten though, they pick something like homemade pizza or something that to a child means 'dinner only' so they think they're getting away with something Last year Luke wanted peanut butter pizza (he LIVES for PB!!!). Being Luke, he suggested it precociously. So, I made English Muffins with PB, chocolate chips, mini marshmallows and that got me the mom of the year award at least for a couple of days!

[WDWJAMBA]

Since it's three of us going back to school each year, the night before is a bit hectic. We don't really do anything special. :

[dejavu]

We don't do anything the night before but I've always baked chocolate chip cookies on the first day of school, warm and smelling yummy for when the kids get home. I almost died yesterday when I had to work until 6pm. So this year, they got them on the second day of school. And they were very very happy.

And Chrissi, do you have your mom's recipe for the chocolate chocolate chip cheesecake? That sounds delish...