in an attempt to serve varied, nutritious and regular meals (and also to enjoy the process of preparing food for the family), the day before yesterday i made zucchini bread, carrot ginger soup, and tomato onion cheddar quiche. for the kids benefit, i made little quichettes, consisting of only the egg custard mixture and cheese. oh, and i made the crust from scratch.
when morgan came to the table, he dissolved into tears at the sight of his dinner. keep in mind, this child currently survives on the following staples: (whole wheat) bread & butter, bananas, yogurt, and some breakfast cereals. now, i made the quichettes knowing that both of my kids like eggs, and cheese, and bread/crust. i tried very hard to convince morgan that the zucchini bread was really like cake (and really, it is), and that the quichette is just eggs and cheese. i did not even TRY to serve him the soup. he refused the eggs outright, and told me the zucchini bread, which is made with cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger and cardamon, smelled like zucchini. what the heck does zucchini smell like, anyway? the meal ended with morgan eating a piece of bread and butter, and me barely holding back-- okay, not holding back -- my fury at his refusal to even TASTE the eggs and zucchini bread. madeleine, i'm happy to report, love the quichette, and zucchini bread; she tasted the carrot soup and gave it a thumbs down, but she did try it and remarked that it seemed "interesting" in color and smell.
i know i shouldn't engage in power struggles over food, but i'm at a loss at what to do with this child who wants to eat bananas and yogurt 3 meals a day. i truly don't care if he won't EAT what i make, but the fact that he won't even TRY it is what gets to me. i know he has some serious super-taster/texture issues going on, but it's hard to get excited about cooking and serving food to your kids when one of them (and sometimes both) reject just about everything, even things they've previously eaten and enjoyed.
yesterday morning, it was madeleine's turn. while she has become a very game eater, and expresses a lot of interest in the health value of foods, getting her dressed these last couple of days has been complete torture. madeleine is one of those "it doesn't feel good" kids. when she was a toddler, putting on a coat which caused her sleeves to bunch up was a regular meltdown experience. i had to buy her shoes a size too big in order for us both to cope. but the strange thing is, this sensitivity seems to wax and wane. i would have thought that we were gradually outgrowing it, but this week has seen the "princess and the pea" return with a vengance. suddenly, the clothes she's been wearing for the past 6 months don't feel good (and it's not because they're too small). nothing feels good, and she turns into an inconsolable and rather nasty puddle of despair. this shirt is too long, this skirt bunches up when i sit, this waistband doesn't feel good. we managed to work through some hysteria over her sneakers, which are relatively new and which she had worn for several weeks without complaint, but the rest of it is going full steam. good god, i can't imagine what it's going to be like when she's a teenager, and has adult size wardrobe crises.
yesterday she had her first ballet class, where they are very particular about the uniform. we needed a blue leotard, and the one she had she had outgrown, but just barely. still, the tears and the trauma came again. i got her into a looser fit black outfit, but when we arrived at class and she saw the eight other girls in blue capezio leotards, she became despondent again. the director managed to find us a blue one in roughly her size, but it was only a minute before i heard her sobs coming from behind the bathroom door. we managed to pull it off after i cut out the tags, but i thought "if i have to endure much more of this i'm going to go mad."
today was better. she dressed herself in a skirt and shirt without a tear, and only got my ire up when she went into a screaming rage at her little brother over the "theft" of the swing she had been using. tonight at dinner, i served whole wheat spaghetti, Ian's fish sticks, and peas. neither child cried. i did not raise my voice. maddy started off with an "i lost my appetite" speech after one look at her plate, but bucked up and ate both fishsticks plus her pasta plus a copious amount of peas. morgan whimpered at the fish sticks, proceeded to peel the breading off of them and eat what remained, ate about 3 strands of spaghetti, and ignored his 5 peas.
on an unrelated note, just before dinner maddy was doing a ginsberg-esque chant with the aid of a tamborine, while morgan provided the interpretive dance segment.
