Food Fight

Not the fun sort.

The "you-are-going-to-eat-this" kind.

I saw a recipe in a magazine for a macaroni cassarole that had peas in it. My kids eat a lot of mac 'n cheese. I decided, I'm going to start putting peas in their mac 'n cheese to make it a "little better".

I have never been a Mom that makes them eat things they don't like. I had such bad experiences growing up and being forced to eat yucky things (liver, homemade clam chowder, chunky tomato spaghetti....to name a few) that I decided I didn't want to do that to my kids. I make them eat what I think is reasonable. And truthfully, I usually just make them what they want. Thus....a lot of mac 'n cheese.

Well Zach was not going to have any of it.

I tasted it. You can't even taste the peas. He can eat this.

The battle began.

He would eat one bite and then make face after face and take forever to chew. I told him that this was how his mac 'n cheese was going to be for now on so he better get use to it. It does not taste bad.

You would think he was being tortured. We had a hard time not laughing.

Then he started the gagging and motions that he was about to throw up (I rememeber doing this with the clam chowder). We were stifling our cracking up. I have sympathy, but boy it is just mac 'n cheese with a few peas....give me a break. It was spit out and then he was told that he could not eat his corn bread w/honey since he didn't eat his mac 'n cheese. Then the full on fit happened. Yelling, crying, screaming, slamming his door. HE WAS NOT HAPPY.

About 10 minutes later he opens his door and asks if he can come out and I tell him to come talk to me. He comes in sheepishly and wants to hug me and sit on me. I told him that Mommy was not happy with the way he was just acting and that we would be eating mac 'n cheese and peas again. He asked if it could be a long, long time; not tonight. I said in a couple of days we would try again.

I really didn't think it would be a big deal. Elissa ate it just fine. She was the one I thought would make a big deal. Zach is my salad eater and spicy eater and so a few peas shouldn't be a big deal.

Wow, I was so wrong.