Well... it's not a 'healthy lunch' by any stretch of the imagination, but neither will they die of metabolic syndrome before reaching puberty from the occasional fluffernutter.
You're an awesome aunt, Connie, and it's because you work hard at keeping that delicate balance between adult values such as good nutrition, and child values such as gooey sweetness. Also you recognize that the childly delight of a rarely-occasional fluffernutter is far sweeter than the delight of a routine everyday fluffernutter.
I always let my kid eat as much of her Halloween, Xmas and Easter candy as she wanted, giving fair warning that too much of it would make her sick. Of course this fair warning was ignored, but it was her candy and her stomach, and after all, experience is the best teacher. LOL, the Xmas she was four, she turned positively green from too much chocolate, and ever after, has been reasonably moderate about sweets.
That's a thing to consider about being STRICT: If you say "No, you can't have a second fluffernutter because it's bad for you", you leave the child-mind CRAVING that second fluffernutter the more because it's been forbidden. If you say "I'll make you a second one if you're sure you can eat that much, but I think it's likely to make you feel sick, so maybe it would be smarter to quit while you're ahead", one of two things will happen. Either the child will be 'full' before the second fluffernutter is half gone, whereat you can complain about wasting food, and justify all your future denials of second fluffernutters on the grounds of "Last time I made it, you didn't eat it".... or.... the child will manage to finish it, and will heartily wish she hadn't. Then all future requests for a second fluffernutter may be answered with "Remember how you felt last time when you ate two? Surely you don't want that again!"
The denial of second fluffernutters on the grounds that then there wouldn't be enough fluff left to make fudge with is clear and reasonable to most children old enough to ask Why?, and doesn't carry any suspicious taint of ForYourOwnGoodism (as long as they're reasonably certain of getting a fair share of the subsequent fudge.) They still don't much like it, and who can blame them? In an ideal world, the jar of marshmallow fluff would never run out, and neither would one's capacity to enjoy the stuff, but alas, that isn't the world we live in.
For myself, OMG no thank you, I do not want a fluffernutter. I didn't even want a fluffernutter when I was the age of your little girlies, because the combination of two different types of sticky sloppiness was revoilting to me. I'm still adamantly opposed to peanut butter combined with anything - I like it well enough eaten with a spoon from the jar, but mixing it with other foods ruins both it and the other foods. Same with marshmallows - I can happily eat half a dozen roasted marshmallows by themselves, but if they've got to be glopped up with chocolate on a graham cracker, then never mind.
In my book, fudge is fudge, and adding anything to it only turns it into second-rate, adulterated fudge. Make that third-rate adulterated fudge if the superfluous additive is anything crunchy such as bits of nuts. Of course, being now at an age where dying of metabolic syndrome is a clear and present danger, I find that the appeal of any kind of processed carbs grows less all the time.
Therefore I say, Gather ye fluffernutters while ye may, and the same for your little nieces. They're not spoiled; what they are is loved.
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You're an awesome aunt, Connie, and it's because you work hard at keeping that delicate balance between adult values such as good nutrition, and child values such as gooey sweetness. Also you recognize that the childly delight of a rarely-occasional fluffernutter is far sweeter than the delight of a routine everyday fluffernutter.
I always let my kid eat as much of her Halloween, Xmas and Easter candy as she wanted, giving fair warning that too much of it would make her sick. Of course this fair warning was ignored, but it was her candy and her stomach, and after all, experience is the best teacher. LOL, the Xmas she was four, she turned positively green from too much chocolate, and ever after, has been reasonably moderate about sweets.
That's a thing to consider about being STRICT: If you say "No, you can't have a second fluffernutter because it's bad for you", you leave the child-mind CRAVING that second fluffernutter the more because it's been forbidden. If you say "I'll make you a second one if you're sure you can eat that much, but I think it's likely to make you feel sick, so maybe it would be smarter to quit while you're ahead", one of two things will happen. Either the child will be 'full' before the second fluffernutter is half gone, whereat you can complain about wasting food, and justify all your future denials of second fluffernutters on the grounds of "Last time I made it, you didn't eat it".... or.... the child will manage to finish it, and will heartily wish she hadn't. Then all future requests for a second fluffernutter may be answered with "Remember how you felt last time when you ate two? Surely you don't want that again!"
The denial of second fluffernutters on the grounds that then there wouldn't be enough fluff left to make fudge with is clear and reasonable to most children old enough to ask Why?, and doesn't carry any suspicious taint of ForYourOwnGoodism (as long as they're reasonably certain of getting a fair share of the subsequent fudge.) They still don't much like it, and who can blame them? In an ideal world, the jar of marshmallow fluff would never run out, and neither would one's capacity to enjoy the stuff, but alas, that isn't the world we live in.
For myself, OMG no thank you, I do not want a fluffernutter. I didn't even want a fluffernutter when I was the age of your little girlies, because the combination of two different types of sticky sloppiness was revoilting to me. I'm still adamantly opposed to peanut butter combined with anything - I like it well enough eaten with a spoon from the jar, but mixing it with other foods ruins both it and the other foods. Same with marshmallows - I can happily eat half a dozen roasted marshmallows by themselves, but if they've got to be glopped up with chocolate on a graham cracker, then never mind.
In my book, fudge is fudge, and adding anything to it only turns it into second-rate, adulterated fudge. Make that third-rate adulterated fudge if the superfluous additive is anything crunchy such as bits of nuts. Of course, being now at an age where dying of metabolic syndrome is a clear and present danger, I find that the appeal of any kind of processed carbs grows less all the time.
Therefore I say, Gather ye fluffernutters while ye may, and the same for your little nieces. They're not spoiled; what they are is loved.