The school year routine meant that the fridge was always full of
whatever fickle lunch requests my children had on a given week. No sooner that one of them decided on their ‘most
favourite thing for lunch ever’, a week later, there was a change of mind to ‘I’m
not eating that any more, it’s disgusting’ and it was back to the drawing
board.
The children were pretty banjaxed last evening after their
first weeks’ holiday of sun, fresh air, athletics and late nights. After a
trip to the newly renovated playground in town, we made a quick trip to Lidl to
get some essentials – cat food, vegetable stock cubes and cat food – and we
headed home.
I could tell from the tired faces that tea was going to be a
battle. Leon spread eagled on the couch,
wanted a big glass of milk. I, his
obedient servant, obliged in pouring a glass, but also emptying the carton. I stood in the kitchen offering suggestions about what the
pair might like to eat, sounding like a broken record saying, ‘I’m not standing
here all night’. I had déjà vu, remembering my mother
saying the same thing when I was a child.
Sorry Mammy Kay, I was a pain in the ass.
Mya,
curled up like a cat, said that she wanted pasta and pesto, Leon,
pancakes. Sorted, thought I, two fail
safe options. Except when there is no pasta in the cupboard or milk in the
fridge to make pancakes. How did I
manage that ? I NEVER run out of
pasta. Ever. Except today.
Just ten minutes previously, I was standing in a shop, laden down with
milk and pasta. On other occasions, I
could set up a pasta shop, with my ‘just in case’ supply of the non-perishable. The observant among you will have noticed
that both menu options were sadly lacking in vitamins, but I can verify that
the children got their quota from the heap of strawberries on Thursday. They ate them so fast that I got none of
them. Not one lovely fresh Wexford
strawberry for me …
No
milk last night, meant no milk for breakfast this morning and I intended today,
Saturday, to have the laziest of starts. There was no option, but pile the two of them
back in the car and drive down to the shops.
Except my little woman was so exhausted that she begged me not to put
her in the car again. Her tired, pasty
face put the guilts on me. Little man,
on the other hand told his sister that she was ‘a big meanie with a lazy bum’
and ordered in the car. Still in her
feline curl, Mya gave him a look that said, ‘I ain’t going anywhere.’
Stand-offs
between two strong minded seven year olds can be trying and I wasn’t in the
humour for refereeing. I chatted to them
to about what compromise was and suggested that they come to a mutually
agreeable solution. Car ? No car ?. Choose
something else for dinner. I showed them
four different frozen veggie options. ‘No’,
they said in unison. ‘They are all DISGUSTING.’ One of
their favourite word these days. Funnily,
I remember my baby brother Eoin as a child, using the same word regularly, often
in reference to new clothes that he didn’t fancy. Maybe the use of certain words are
hereditary.
I
advised the children to hurry up with their decision as I was opening my bottle
of wine any minute. They huffed and puffed from their couch throne. I opened the wine. I cooked some risotto rice and thought about
drinking the wine directly from the bottle.
I
put the pesto into the fluffy cooked rice. It looked
good. Real comfort food. ‘That’s what people eat in Rome, you
know. I ate it there and it was yummy,’ I
said, hoping that somehow this statement would conjure up an exoticness in
their little tired, grumpy heads and encourage them to eat.
I
put two bowls in front to the pair and disappeared into the bedroom to take a
telephone call. ‘It’s DISGUSTING Mam !’,
the boy roared from the sitting room. I
knew rightly that he hadn’t even tried it.
Phone call over, I noted that my tiny girl had eaten both bowls of rice. Not a scrap left. A 50% success rate. Not bad.
The
boy announced that he would like French toast.
Maybe all that talk of Rome had made him feel continental. ‘I thought that you didn’t like French toast
any more Leon ?.’ ‘I changed my mind Mam.’
I was wondering if he only wanted it so that he could crack the eggs in
the bowl. But no, he horsed into three
big slices of the eggy, bready mix. Mya
decided that she wanted a slice too, despite her recent declaration that she won’t
eat eggs in anything unless she ‘can’t see them’, because guess what ? ‘They
are disgusting.’
Two
well fed, tired children went to bed and I had a second, peaceful glass of
wine.
It’s
now the day-after-the-night-before. I’m
writing this blog, looking out on my garden, through my rather fabulous window
boxes. My boy is snuggled beside me
watching Minecraft videos and little woman is still in a deep sleep. I’d love to bring a bowl of porridge into my
leaba, to complete the cosy, satisfied feeling, but alas, milk hasn’t miraculously
appeared in my fridge overnight. It’s
too early for wine. Now that I’m
on a roll, I might try some of that French toast for my boy and I. Before it becomes disgusting again. Failing that, I’m sure that there is
chocolate somewhere.
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