Jessica Biel: The first two weeks of school are so chaotic and stressful
Summer is more than halfway over, and school districts around the country are starting to open back up for the new school year. My children are already back in school because we go to a year-round school, where every nine weeks, they get three weeks off plus a few extra weeks around Christmas/New Years and 4th of July. We love it. Our kids really benefit from getting a “brain break” every nine weeks. It’s also great that they’re not out of school long enough to forget what they’ve already learned. Another huge benefit is that we don’t really ever lose that school routine where we have to all do a stressful readjustment.
Jessica Biel has two (possibly unvaccinated) sons with Justin Timberlake. Her older son, Silas, is eight and her younger one, Phineas, is three. School is starting back up soon for Silas, and Jessica gets how stressful back-to-school time can be for parents. She’s been out there doing the “relatable mom” thing while hustling new bento-inspired pre-packed lunches that she teamed up with DoorDash to create in order to help parents during those hectic first few weeks back at school.
Back-to-school season presents plenty of challenges that families just don’t have to think about during the summer. And that’s something Jessica Biel says she’s absolutely experiencing in the ramp-up to her oldest son Silas’s return to class. And one of the most stressful conundrums is figuring out what to pack the 8-year-old for lunch.
“I was just griping to my friends and family and even on my social media, like, ‘What am I going to do about lunches? How am I going to handle this?’” admits Biel. “It’s so chaotic, the first couple of weeks of school, and it’s stressful. Your kids are feeling the stress, and you’re feeling the stress, and all you want to do is be on your game and be like one step ahead.”
It’s for that reason that she was inspired to partner with DoorDash to create Grab & Go Bento, bento-inspired lunches for stressed parents. The lunches were such a success that they sold out quickly, but the app is also touting their convenient grocery delivery, which makes it easy to stock up on groceries for the week or refresh what’s running out.
The way the app can simplify meal prep is particularly useful to Biel as she strives to find balanced breakfasts and lunches for her boys. “If I don’t ask [my son what he wants to eat, he] comes back and says, ‘You didn’t tell me what I was gonna have in my lunch,’” she shares. “So, he feels surprised by what I’ve put in there. Even though I think, ‘Oh, these are his favorite things. He’ll love this.’ It’s so funny. I feel like I can never win. I’m really all about trying to make my life a little bit simpler and trying to help other parents do the same just because I deeply know how hard it is.”
Biel adds that anything that takes the thinking out of creating balanced meals is “such an incredible help when you’re trying to get back in your rhythm to get back into school.”
I understand what Jessica is saying here. Like I said above, we’re lucky that we never quite get to a place where we completely fall out of routine, but starting a new school year can still be stressful and chaotic. Honestly, when I first heard about Jessica’s Grab & Go DoorDash boxes, I assumed that it would be some overpriced Goop-adjacent thing. I looked it up on DoorDash’s website and turns out it’s five meals for $25, which seems fairly reasonable to me? The lunches also seem pretty standard: a bagel, sunflower seed butter and jelly, salami, fruit snacks, white cheddar puffs, etc.
However, I have to admit that I sort of snort-chuckled at, “What am I going to do about lunches? How am I going to handle this?” I know she’s shilling her product but she sounds soooo melodramatic. Bish, you aren’t worried about how you’re going to afford to feed your kid. You’re worried about figuring out how to throw some fancy PB&J, gluten-free goldfish, and organic apple slices together. FWIW, DoorDash does say that they’ll donate five meals per purchase to the All Peoples Community Center to “aid in the organization’s commitment to help children succeed at each stage of development.” It would be great if Jessica and Justin could at the very least match that donation since nothing says, “I want to help relieve parents who are stressing over lunches during the chaotic first few weeks of school” quite like donating to an organization that will help parents stressing over providing lunches to their kids during (and beyond) those first few weeks of school.
Photos credit Faye’s Vision/Cover Images, JB Autissier/Panoramic/Avalon
ncG1vNJzZmivp6x7pLHLnpmirJOdxm%2BvzqZmcWppaoR3e8meqqyhk5aso7XEpZatoJWUs6q%2B0q2Wra%2BflMSmscqslqiej6iwqbvOpZaaqpWUwLCrwqGYqKyZmKyiusOYqq2qlajAp8HLaA%3D%3D