Should I give her dinner after nursery?

[Future-Sailor]

My 18 month old goes to nursery 3 days a week. At nursery they have tea at 3:30pm. I collect her from nursery and we get home at around 6pm. Bedtime is 8pm. 3:30pm seems a bit early for tea; on her days at home with me I serve dinner at 6pm. Should I be giving her food after nursery? What do you do? I'd love to know

 

[lozzy21]

My dd has her tea at nursery at a similar time so i normally give her some fruit or toast and a yogurt when we get home.

 

[holly2234]

I would just give a snack. Maybe a banana or a piece of toast or yoghurt or something. When my DD was at nursery for full days, they had dinner at 3:30pm too but at that time, she went to bed at 6 so it was ok. But since your DD's bed time is later a snack about 6ish when youve got home will probably make her feel full until morning.

 

[Rosie06]

my lo has tea the same time at nursery but they only give a snack tea so things like sandwichs beans on toast toasted muffin its basically to tide them over till they are home, ive still been giving LO some tea as normal but just a little less than i would normally serve as what she has at nursery is larger than the snack she would have at home IYSWIM if she doesnt eat it i dont worry so much then i give her supper as normal x

 

[Mum2b_Claire]

my lo has tea the same time at nursery but they only give a snack tea so things like sandwichs beans on toast toasted muffin its basically to tide them over till they are home, ive still been giving LO some tea as normal but just a little less than i would normally serve as what she has at nursery is larger than the snack she would have at home IYSWIM if she doesnt eat it i dont worry so much then i give her supper as normal x

this! The nursery tea can be a bit of a nuisance actually I find, it isn't a proper meal yet stops her from really wanting much for dinner at home.

 

[Lauren25]

I think it depends on what she's having for tea at nursery if it's not much I'd offer her tea but if it's quite a bit maybe just a snack!

 

[x__amour]

My LO has a small snack at 3pm at daycare so we give her some supper around 5pm.

 

[DaisyBee]

What is tea, dinner, and supper in the uk? I get so confused over the terms. Anything at 3:30 to me would be a snack not an actual meal. Is "tea" at 3:30 a meal??

 

[sunshine114]

What is tea, dinner, and supper in the uk? I get so confused over the terms. Anything at 3:30 to me would be a snack not an actual meal. Is "tea" at 3:30 a meal??

It depends... Some people call the midday meal lunch, others call it dinner, then the evening meal can be called either dinner or tea. SupPer is something eaten before bed usually. It's so complicated as different people call meals different things!

To op I think it would depend on what LO was eating a half 3, but I'd probably just offer something like cereal, toast or yoghurt (assuming there is a cooked meal at some point in the day at nursery)

 

[smelly07]

I worked in various nurseries and they have breakfast, lunch and 'tea' (dinner) but for lunch they have a big hot cooked meal i.e lasagne etc so they are essentially having their dinner at lunch time iykwim so 'tea' is usually like a lunch type meal, i think they get plenty to eat during nursery time breakfast-snack-lunch-snack-tea .....that they only need another little snack before bed - also depending on how much they have eaten during the day.

However i agree that meal times in nurseries are silly but thats to accomadate staff lunches and shift patterns x

 

[k4th]

Dd gets a light tea at around 3.30 on nursery days, but also a large cooked lunch. We tend to do supper with bedtime milk on nursery days eg crumpets, potato cakes, pancakes, fruited teacakes etc.

 

[Future-Sailor]

Thank you for all your replies ladies Much appriciated! I tend to just give her something small after nursery and she never seems to eat much of it anyway....but I'm glad to see that most of you do the same x