Joe was a carbohydrate king from the beginning. For a while, Joe knew every grilled cheese in the St. Louis vicinity. He could describe them to you in vivid detail. I used to joke that Joe went to a lecture and decided to be a vegetarian, because for a long time, no matter how I disguised it, Joe refused chicken and beef. Fish was out of the question. He still often refuses meat today.
I would like to think that all that spicy food pre-natally helped Jessie acquire her taste for a variety of foods. Jessie ate Chinese and Greek food as soon as she went from liquids to solid food. She was and is much more adventurous which delights us. IF nobody is around to sway her decisions, (read: her brother can’t first say how gross something is or the cause is lost) she will try just about anything.
What confuses us even more is that in life Joe is an adventurous kid. He will try anything. Climb any rock, ride any trail, swim any ocean. He likes to be challenged. He thrives on it. But, not with food.
Jessie is our reigning Cheeseburger Queen. She loves them and will order one at any restaurant. She doesn’t care if they look different or even taste different, she’s okay as long as it’s a cheeseburger. Scary, but she could survive on cheeseburgers if she had to. And in fact she has. Last spring while in California, she must have had a cheeseburger ten nights straight. I know, I know, real healthy!
Then there is the challenge of: what to make for dinner… It can become an even bigger burden to satisfy everyone’s needs. I refuse to be a short order cook, so often we all sit down to the same meal, but the kids’ meal has had a simplifying makeover. I love to hear stories of children who eat salmon, chicken, vegetables, and stir-fry. I always make sure my kids are listening to those conversations. They don’t, somehow, ever get the hint that there are children in the world who actually eat a variety of foods.
