My Faith and Joy… and Boys!

What could possibly make me get on an airplane and leave this island paradise?

Nothing other than my very own slice of heaven on earth:

Going barefoot in Bermuda was absolutely amazing, but there’s nothing quite as wonderful as being home with my family.  Now if only I could import those tropical temperatures! 

Can you spot Becky’s latest trick?  (Hint: Look at her tray).

Did you find it?  She portioned out nearly all of her veggies into the side compartment.  As I put her food on her tray, she patiently consumed the delectables and weeded out the undesirables.  She must have thought that I wouldn’t make her eat those banished morsels.  Nice try, kiddo!      

See this beautiful, appetizing blueberry “lazy man’s pancake” pie?

Well, it ended up in my garbage disposal.  What, you may ask, would make a sane person dump this beautiful breakfast down the drain?  No, I didn’t have second thoughts about personally consuming a dish made with half of stick of butter (I probably should have, but that’s beside the point).   

Truth be told, the dish is actually undercooked, and thus inedible.  Why would I undercook a dish for which I was experiencing anticipatory salivation all morning?

Because while this golden beauty was baking (the pie, not me), I was listening through the monitor to the girls’ joyful squealing up in their cribs.  I was shaking my head at their refusal to take a nap, but I figured it was only a matter of time before they exhausted themselves into slumber.  As I was watching the oven timer tick down, I heard a crash-bang-boom…and then a wail.  This is not an uncommon occurrence in our household, but something about the pitch of the wail made me instantly forget my hunger and race up the stairs.  I opened the nursery door to find a sobbing Becky with blood pouring out of her mouth onto her sheets.  I frantically picked her up and ascertained that there was no major damage, and that she must have fallen against the crib slats and bit the inside of her mouth.  I knew there was going to be quite a bit of clean-up and child soothing involved, so I went downstairs and mournfully removed my not-quite-baked pie and turned off the oven.  I figured it was better to ruin the breakfast by undercooking it, rather than be unable to return downstairs at the proper time to get it out of the oven, and thus overcook it and make my house smell like burnt butter.  I went back upstairs, cleaned up Becky and calmed Susie, who was experiencing empathic trauma (or maybe just jealousy from all her sister’s attention), stripped and remade the crib sheets, soaked the bloody bedding with stain remover and threw them in the wash, and then returned the children to their room to see if we could salvage the rest of their nap, and perhaps the pie.  The girls indeed fell asleep, but the pie was beyond rescuing, so into the sink it went.  I suppose I could have stuck it back in the oven to see if I could make it edible, but I had actually lost my appetite for it by then.

But don’t worry – I made up for all the calories I could have consumed in the pie by treating myself to a full-fat Starbucks treat this evening.  Caffeine and chocolate and happy children:  my recipe for success!

Susie’s definition of “dessert”:

Eating the leftover Cheerios she’s found at the bottom of her car seat.  She saves the best for last!   

Don’t you ever wish that you could really enjoy food again?  Don’t you wish you could wolf down whatever was put in front of you without a single worry about your waistline, or whether you were getting food on your face, or whether someone watching would think you were being too energetic in your consumption?  Don’t you wish you could clap when you saw your meal being prepared (or for that matter, don’t you wish someone else prepared your food at all)?  Don’t you wish you could hum and yum and groan with pleasure as you savor each bite of food? 

When we were at Jim’s Nana’s place earlier this week, she insisted that the girls try an ice cream sandwich while she and I ate coffee cake.  As I fed the girls their first ever bites of that delectable goody and watched as they nearly bounced out of their seats with excitement at this new taste sensation, it struck me that I had seen this level of food appreciation before.  I looked over at Nana eagerly eating her cake as she hummed with happiness and dropped quite a bit of it into her lap, and I smiled at the family resemblance.  The girls may not have Nana’s puppy-dog eyes, but they have her deep, abiding love of food.  Since the girls already enjoy snacking on the leftover cheerios that fall into the depths of their car seats, and last week I caught Susie stuffing food into the pocket of her bib, I fear that it won’t be long before they’re following Nana’s lead and stuffing jelly donuts in their coat pockets at all-you-can-eat buffets!