Finally, went away with my husband for 2 nights. The kids were alone with sitters for the first time on overnights. Here are my (pretty hilarious) instructions to our fabulous caretakers about food:

Hi guys,

The kitchen is stocked, here are some guidelines:

ALICE IS ALLERGIC TO EGGS

even though I just wrote that in caps, please don’t make a big deal about this in front of her. I did, at first, making her terrified and shy about trying foods. Her allergy is very mild, don’t worry about checking ingredients, just ask her to pay attention to how her mouth feels. If the food has eggs in it, her tongue may get itchy and she will stop eating on her own. But, obviously, don’t give her eggs. I am writing about this because both Lucy and Rose love scrambled eggs for breakfast. You can also hard boil Lucy eggs for her lunch at Zoo camp.

Otherwise, as I think you know, the kids are allowed to eat what they want, when they want. They each have their own foodshelf in the cupboard. The order from top to bottom is Lucy, Alice, Rose. In the fridge, Lucy is in the middle, Alice the drawer above, Rose below drawer below. How it works is you make their meal– cereal, eggs, pasta, whatever. They cannot keep asking for food or ask you to keep making food. You are not a short order cook or servant. If they do not like what you made or do not feel like eating it, they can get whatever they want from their foodshelves, bring it to the table and eat it. I don’t care if they eat cereal for dinner or oreos for breakfast. Just make sure you put something healthy out.

If someone runs out of something on her foodshelf and the other kid is eating that thing in front of her, she has to share it or put it away.

NOT ALLOWED
to eat after dinner because they use eating to manipulate bedtime
to eat something in front of the other, if she doesnt have any, without sharing
to keep asking you to make food

Also, please do not use food as a reward. If you want, you can use the event of going out to get something and eating there as the reward, but not the food. If you promise them food, you should be prepared to give it to them even if they misbehave.

Here’s some stuff in the kitchen now that they like:

Cereal
Eggs (Rose and Lucy)
Fishsticks in freezer (Alice loves with ketchup)
Pasta
Tortellini
Bagels
Broccoli
Asparagus
Frozen peas
Chicken with stars soup (Alice loves)
Black beans (Alice loves)
Whipped Yoplait yogurt (Alice loves)
Wonder bread, ham, cheese, salami, jelly/ butter sabwich, rice cakes with peanut butter, granola bars– all can be for Lucy’s lunch

You will probably need to buy milk. I’m leaving an envelope of $ for each of you. Let me know if you had to spend more.

PLEASE PUT SUNSCREEN ON LUCY BEFORE CAMP, make sure she has water bottle for camp

THANK YOU GOOD LUCK!

More info on how I feed my kids in order to prevent eating disorders (or, possibly to document exactly how I screwed them up)  here.