Two months after my kids’ schools shut down due to the coronavirus pandemic, I feel no shame in saying that the challenges of managing working from home while homeschooling a 3-year-old and an 8-year-old have wrought havoc on our parenting routines. I am slightly ashamed, however, about what that has meant for my progeny’s intake of Lucky Charms.

In the Before Times, sugared cereals were, if not outright banned in our house, definitely a sometimes food. Our kids made do with quick, high-protein breakfasts: A bowl of oatmeal. A slice of toast smeared with peanut butter. A hardboiled egg. They begged and pleaded for super sweet a.m. alternatives with each trip through the cereal aisle, but we always stood firm—until my wife grabbed four $3 boxes of marshmallow cereal in an early-in-the-shutdown grocery delivery panic, and everything changed.