Around the time the Princess was born I had an epiphany- I could kill the planet just a little bit and waste some money, but improve my life significantly.

About a month before the Princess was due I decided to buy a package of paper plates.

Loading and unloading the dishwasher is my least favorite job when 9 months pregnant. All the bending is just too much when you are carrying an 8 pound child, plus the time it took to do all the dishes after every meal it was maddening.

So I gave in and bought a package of 100 paper plates.

You know what, the world didn’t end.

I thought it was going to, but it just kept right on turning.

And you know what else, it was fabulous.

It was fabulous that after lunch, instead of scrubbing dishes I could just throw them away.

And it was great that after making dinner, I only had to wash the pans (on the off chance that we used paper plates for dinner).

I’ve been against paper plates… pretty much forever.

I was set on using real plates every day. At some point we migrated to IKEA plastic plates, but still they were “real” plates.

Paper plates seemed like the lazy way out to me, or that you’re confused about whether or not you’re at a picnic, either way not a good choice.

I was so wrong, almost as wrong as Mr. Spreadsheets was when he told me there was no way Donald Trump could win the presidency (turns out his wrong was a much bigger deal, but I digress).

We don’t use paper plates for every meal every day, we don’t even use them every day, but you know what?

They are a great option, a great sanity saver, a great way for me to feel just a little bit more in control of my life when things are hectic and messy.

Harry Potter informed me that I was killing the planet when I bought a huge stack of paper plates at Sam’s Club today, I told him too bad, it’s either the planet or a person, he looked appalled that I could be so insensitive to Mother Earth.

I am sure we will get to a point where paper goes back to being picnic casual, but I’m pretty sure that won’t happen until everyone is fully potty trained and can feed themselves.

Around the same time I started buying paper plates I decided it was time to buy prepackaged snacks. Like most children, Harry Potter and AsthmaMan (and now the Princess) enjoy snacks when we are out and about, between meals, basically any time I will allow them to have a snack. There are two problems with this:

1. They often can’t get their own snack,

and 2. If they get their own snack they don’t understand portion control.

Oh and I failed to mention that we live in a humid climate, so about 3 minutes after you open a bag of chips, pretzels, or crackers they go stale. One of my kids has literally  said “Mom! These crackers are too crunchy” when handed a fresh cracker, they don’t know any better. Except oh wait they do, and they don’t love soft chips and pretzels… so the stale ones get wasted. Enter prepackaged snacks.

These solve a myriad of issues:

1. The kid can serve their own snack, all the kid has to do is select a snack, cut open the package, and start eating

2. Portion control is no longer an issue, when the snack is gone they’re done

3. Things can’t get stale if they are meant to be consumed in one sitting.

My mom is right, prepackaged snacks are more expensive, pretty sure I could have bought 3 giant bags of veggie straws for less than the small packs, but you know what? These are going to get eaten, and added bonuses (as if that wasn’t enough already) if you forget that it was your turn to bring the team snack until you’re loading up the car to go to the game you can just shop in your pantry, and when you’re kids lose interest in a particular snack, you can just pack up the box and save it until they like it again because nothing is going to get stale.

I think it’s worth it. The planet might die a little bit more, and I might waste some money, but I get to keep a little bit more of my sanity… so let’s just call it a win.