4568 milligrams
January 13, 2006
Dylan, like a lot of other 7 year olds, is a real dawdler at bedtime. He uses every excuse in the book but the one that really burns my ass is, “I’m hungry.” He uses that one EVERY NIGHT. This is preceeded by a half eaten dinner and protests of “I’m full,” not an hour and a half before.
He is THE Drama King. He BEGS me to let him snack after school, and since he eats lunch at 11 at his school, I always give him an after school snack of course or else he will DIE (his words). But dinnertime is a fight. He inpects his food and if his chicken so much as looks at his potatoes, it’s game over. Any sort of skin on his potatoes? Nope. Any fat on his meat? Nope. Won’t touch it. Some nights his face is so close to the plate I want to smoosh his face into the food, just for kicks. I’m evil like that.
Last week he insisted that he doesn’t like chicken anymore. Well I hate pork, so that leaves steak and beef, and a) I’m not a fan of the red meat; and b) We aren’t rolling in money over here. So we eat alot of chicken and fish. Oh Daren? He will eat anything. Except Hamburger Helper. Which is kife anyway and I wouldn’t feed it to my dog. I hate processed crap. Hamburger Helper is the very definition of processed crap. Please tell me you don’t eat that shit.
Anyway, Dylan’s diet leaves alot to be desired lately and although I can (and do) make him eat his veggies, that kid would leave on peanut butter and honey sandwiches, Kraft Dinner and Cheerios for the rest of his childhood if I let him. I came from a “clean your plate” household and we were made to sit until the plate was clean. I won’t do that to my kids for several obvious reasons. I think it’s child abuse, for one.
Dylan has been eating non-stop for days. I’m thrilled! Last night, we had spaghetti and he went for seconds. That never happens. I know it’s a growth spurt, but I made the huge mistake of saying it in front of him. On our mother-son quality talk-n-walk to get a few groceries the other night, he asked me what it meant. I explained that he would be more hungry, more tired and his legs might ache a little, but it was just his body’s way of dealing with the growth spurt and that it shouldn’t last too long.
So tonight, after snacking from after school until dinner, polishing off a huge plate of mashed potatoes, carrots and half a pork chop (he would have kept going but there was ‘FAT, MOM’), THEN eating a bowl of Cheerios an hour later…..I ask him to put his jammies on and what’s his response? “I’m hungry.”
“No you’re not. You just ate for the last 4 hours.”
“I’m HAVING a GROWTH SPURT! Can’t you SEE I’m having a GROWTH SPURT MOM? You HAVE to feed me something!” Falls to the floor, pretending to convulse and drool.
I couldn’t help but laugh. Now he has had some kiwi, and he’s reading in his bed.
What do you want to bet he will tell me he’s hungry when I say lights out?
I’ll bet you a box of Hamburger Kife.
And look! Hamburger Helper Nutrition Facts from this site. Disgusting. Look at the sodium! And the fat! The calories! My stomach is churning just thinking about it.
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May 7th, 2006 at 6:33 pm
[...] Anyhoooo….. Some of those commercials out there are the worst. Consider the one for a certain cleaning product where they are showing the different messes that the product can clean up, and the very last mess is “Dad’s Spaghetti Night.” Okay Dad’s Spaghetti Night looks like a bloody massacre. There is sauce everywhere - including the wall….not just the usual splotches and droplets, but we’re talking Dad dove into the spaghetti and did flutterkicks on his belly. COME ON. No one makes that kind of mess. Or how about the dorky dad who quickly and easily makes some packaged dinner and the kids are amazed that dad can “cook.” Yeah, Dad heated up some processed shit and it tastes great. It probably has 4568 milligrams of sodium! Fortunately, my boys are growing up and seeing that both Mommy and Daddy can cook and that we work together to get things done. [...]
May 15th, 2006 at 8:46 am
[...] I went into the kitchen and turned on the oven to pre-heat it, looking inside first to make sure my lovely husband hadn’t put dishes in there. That’s a bad habit of his, you know. As I was dressing the roast in it’s brand spanking new roasting pan, I smelled smoke. I turned to see my brand new oven smoking like a bonfire! I screamed, “Fire!” and Daren’s Dad came running in. Keep in mind our kitchen was the size of a postage stamp. He opened the door to the oven, looked inside, grabbed a towel and pulled the flaming oven manual out of the back of the oven and threw it in the sink. The smoke detector went off, screeching through our apartment, deafening my special guests. I was mortified. We opened the balcony door and all was okay after that, but I felt terrible and stupid. All I kept thinking was, “Your son married an idiot guys, and I’m sorry.” We sat around the table for dinner that night, while Daren’s parents and grandmother told me stories of embarrassing things they had done in front of their in-laws, about cooking stories gone wrong, and about the time my mother-in-law served Hamburger Helper and my father-in-law took one look at it, threw it at the wall, narrowly missing Daren’s head, and disappeared to the bar. He was a young father, under alot of stress and this was a one time (now funny) incident that is forever etched in the family history. Right beside my flaming oven-manual story. That night I learned that we can’t be perfect, especially at times like these, when we try to make such good impressions. Ever since that fateful dinner, I knew I would be considered a daughter to these wonderful people. [...]