Cracking up

animal crackers, originally uploaded by Reid Pierce.

Thank Barnum for animal crackers. Eating dinner together as a family is often more idealistic than practical, especially right now when Sawyer is clawing at my legs around 5:30 and we can't seem to scrap together a decent meal until 7:30. But, many nights, Sawyer still wants to sit with us, even after he's eaten, and since I'm not really interested in having him climb me or my chair while I try to eat, the challenge is to find some way to occupy him. That, my friends, is what animal cracker were designed for. Plop him in the booster. Give him the whole box. Let him hold it by the string. Make him figure out how to open the cardboard and wax paper. Let him mine the crackers out one by one with sticky fists. Eat in peace. But don't look over at the kid too often cause mushy grahams is not a pretty picture.

Getting Sawyer to eat lately has been a challenge. He's has been on a vegetable strike for months. And, recently, he has been rejecting food in general. He either purses his lips tight as I offer him a spoonful of something or he'll actually put something in his mouth only to spit it right back out. The whole thing gives me a complex. Some days I handle it better than others. Last night was not my most shining moment.

I had the best intentions. A four-square. Little cubes of pork chop left over from last night. Cut up green beans. A scoop of cottage cheese and a scoop of apple sauce. Very well rounded. He wanted nothing to do with the pork. I had zapped it for too long and the pieces were tough and chewy, and maybe a bit too spicy. He mowed the scoop of apple sauce and cottage cheese and ate a few green beans I'd hidden in the cottage cheese, but when he was done he was still hungry. He started whining. I quickly made him a tofu dog. He was fooled only long enough to put a piece in his mouth, but spit it out immediately. The whining got louder.

Scott started in with the peanut gallery about how he wouldn't eat tofu dogs and he doesn't blame the kid. The level of panic was rising. Sawyer's whining had reached a new pitch and all my nerves were on edge. I couldn't feed the kid fast enough. I didn't know what he'd eat. I didn't want to waste food. I decided to try some Easy Mac - don't judge me - the kind I buy for Justin in the summer that he can make all by himself in the microwave. I measured out the right amount of water in the bowl. Poured in the powdered sauce and tried to stir the clumpy lumps of cheese that were forming.

"Did you read the directions?" the peanut man asked. Of course. The first half. "You aren't supposed add the sauce until after you cook it." By now Scott had picked up Sawyer who was in full meltdown mode, barely breathing between sobs. I couldn't take it anymore. I had f-ed up the mac-and-cheese that even Justin can make. I started crying too, a bowl full of gloppy uncooked mac and powdered cheese still in my hands.

Peanut man to the rescue. Scott embraced us all in a big group hug. Gave crying Sawyer to crying mommy, chopped up some turkey sandwich meat that Sawyer ate like it was going out of style, fed him the rest of the apple sauce and several more scoops of cottage cheese and the day was saved. Thanks peanut man. We love you.

I don't know why the food thing stresses me out so much. The mission seems simple. Prevent starvation. Be healthy. Try new things. Offer variety. But it was so much easier when there was only one thing on the menu and I didn't harbor a guilty conscience about my son's singular obsession for hotdogs and cheese puffs.