Skip to main content

Bon Appetit

I may have mentioned somewhere that I'm a little overtired.  Naturally, that led me to try something new.  I recruited our boys to pick dinner recipes and cook with me once a week.  Because cooking with a three and five-year-old takes no patience whatsoever.

The truth is, so long as I can handle a little extra mess and the fact that it may take a bit longer, the boys are pretty capable.  They look through their cookbook (I highly recommend the Sesame Street books - simple, healthy and actually pretty tasty recipes) and pick out the recipe they want to cook with me.  Then I set them up with tasks that are appropriate.

Our first round Fischer picked salad with hard boiled eggs and Sawyer picked a simple chicken Parmesan recipe.  It turns out that Fischer doesn't like salad and Sawyer doesn't like chicken Parmesan.  Go figure.  Round two was a little more successful.  Fischer picked banana pancakes and Sawyer picked sloppy joes and cream of "any old thing" soup (we chose broccoli).

The boys were able to wash produce, tear lettuce, peel veggies, and cut some of the "softer" veggies - I have a special tool for that.  They add ingredients that I have measured out and stir them.  They set the table.  These are all things I didn't take time to do with them when I was cooking before the babies.  Somehow, having fewer expectations of myself has led to us slowing down a bit and giving the boys more opportunities to shine.

I only cook with one of the boys at a time.  It is their opportunity for one-on-one time with me and their chance to get some positive reinforcement in this chaotic stage of life.  They enjoy it, I enjoy it...mostly.  Plus it's two fewer dinners I have to think of each week!  It's an activity I highly recommend.

Not to mention they are learning to cook....and their future wives can thank me later!

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Not Ready for Those Birds and Bees

 It's spring.  Officially.  But unofficially it's been looking a lot like spring for the last few weeks.  Trees are starting to bloom.  Wildflowers are popping up everywhere.  The birds are singing in the mornings.  Deer are running through our yard constantly, and the turkeys are everywhere.   Last week we almost hit a turkey that was in the middle of the road.  I'm usually pretty cautious but this guy was at the crest of a hill, and I couldn't see him until we were right up in his tail feathers.  It didn't help that he wasn't making any attempt to get out of the road.   "He must be hurt," I told the boys.  "It looks like he's been hit by a car.  He is acting really weird."   We crept by him in the opposite lane.  I had nothing to dispatch him with and wasn't about to use my hands, so I wasn't going to stop.   As we passed Sawyer shouted, "And he's even got another turkey under him!" Oh....
Post a Comment
Read more

Sheltering in Place

In the past three months Corona Virus has more or less turned the world on its head.  I feel almost guilty for not being more stressed or put out by the whole thing.  We have been extremely fortunate. What we thought was a most impractical move on our part, wound up being a huge blessing.  With our two boys and our two newborns, we moved out of our house with no yard in the city limits and into my parents' house in the country while waiting for our new house to be completed.  The weekend we moved "quarantine," "social distancing," and "shelter in place" became the new mantra of our state.   Moving in with my parents meant ten plus acres of play space and two extra able bodied adults to help even out the score with the four kids.  Win for the St. Clair's!  Unfortunately, my parents are beginning to realize they may have made an error in judgement.   Yesterday, Sawyer gave their cat swimming lessons.   Last week th...
1 comment
Read more

Caffeine High

 This week was full of playdates, dinner guests, Vacation Bible School, and a variety of other activities - all good things, but a lot.  Before the week was half over, I was dragging a bit.  I needed a boost to get through my day.  A nap sounded pleasant in theory, but kids.....   Option number two was coffee.  It seemed like a good plan at noon.  Unfortunately, it took me another hour to make it happen.   Apparently, I'm no longer a two coffee a day person.  Even if the second coffee is more sugar than caffeine (thank you local coffee stand).  It  definitely did it's job, it just did it a little too well.  We got through our day in one piece and put the kids to bed by 7:30.   Between 7:30 and 9:00, I fit in another whole day worth of projects.  Dishes, gardening, weed whacking, chicken chores, laundry - it was an epic amount of activity.  And I felt great!  It didn't occur to me why I was so ...
2 comments
Read more