I hate cereal

The kids love cold cereal. If they could have it for every meal and then for a snack twice a day, I don’t think there would be any complaining.  I on the other hand am not cereal’s biggest fan.  If I never ate another bowl of cereal again, I don’t think I’d complain, not even once.  I would happily never set foot on the cereal aisle ever again.

There are many things I don’t like about cereal.  There seems to be a direct link with the amount of sugar and artificial flavorings and the amount that the children like the cereal.  I have one blonde hair boy (who shall remain nameless) who picks out all the sugary raisins in raisin bran and leaves the bran flakes.  There is also a direct correlation between the sugar in the cereal and how quickly the cereal gets eaten.  Plain cheerios will stay in the pantry until there is no cereal left. Sugar for breakfast usually results in someone crashing from the sugar high and crying.  Cereal = crying

Besides the lack of nutritional value, I hate the waste factor.

If the child’s appropriate milk to cereal ratio is used, then we are left with cups of milk and cereal remnants in the bowl.  When I insist the left over milk is drank, crying ensues. If my milk to cereal ratio is used, the result is crying, lots of crying.  I can guarantee that either way, someone will cry.  Cereal = crying.

Cereal also seems to be accompanied by these two phrases:

I think you’re eyes are bigger than your stomach. 

and

You can always have more but you can’t have less.

When my kids look back on their childhood, I’m sure that these will be the things that they strive not to say to their kids.  Along with my favorite

You get what you get, and you don’t throw a fit

which is usually said when I am insisting that my milk to cereal ratio is used and the back ground noise is crying.  Lots of it.

Cereal’s one saving grace might be the convenience factor.  It’s easy, it’s fast, it’s simple.  It’s particularly nice now that even my youngest can pour themselves a bowl of cereal.  This is extremely nice when someone wakes up at 5 am and is starving.  Without cereal, every 5 minutes, Nathaniel (it’s always Nathaniel) pokes me while I’m sleeping and says:  “I’m hungry.”  Every five minutes!

In theory, cereal should grant me a few extra hours of sleep.  Yet, if the milk is too high, too full, the favorite cereal eaten, the bowl gets too full, not full enough, the milk to cereal ratio is thrown off of balance, then there is crying.  So once again:  Cereal = crying.

And being woken up at 5 am to crying about spilled milk, cereal ratios, and anything to do with cereal is never the perfect start to the morning.  Also, waking up and finding full bowls of wasted milk littering the table makes my blood boil, which results in someone crying (namely me).

This is why I hate cereal.

The day the cereal runs out is a happy day for me. I purchase cereal once a month.  While at the store, everyone can pick their favorite bag (because the bag is just as good as the box AND the bag doesn’t have a cartoon character, a prize, or extra packaging) of cereal.  That’s 6 bags of cereal.  Enough for a month.  When it runs out, we don’t buy more until the following month (and sometimes it can be longer).  The kids usually spend a day or two complaining of the lack of cold cereal, but I find that though I’m a slave to the kitchen for one extra meal, there seems to be so much less crying.  And I can always do with less crying!