Every day small miracles happen. Xander, my pickiest eater by far, surprised me today at lunch.
It was one of those days where I seriously contemplated bundling the boys up and taking them out to McDonald's for a picnic lunch in the truck. We've been in the house for three whole days now, and have at least one more to go. We also have about six inches of snow on the ground with the white stuff still falling (and that's a lot in our part of the world, if you're wondering). So that one more day may turn into three or four if the local schools stay closed.
But in the end, I decided it wasn't worth the risk. While I feel completely comfortable driving my four-wheel drive SUV on the dry snow (not wet snow and ice like earlier in the week), I don't have so much faith in everyone else. Usually it only has to rain for traffic accidents to spike in our city, so snow is a whole other level of bad things just waiting to happen.
So we stayed in. And I made the next best thing - chicken nuggets and french fries in the deep fryer (healthy, I know). I also made some homemade macaroni and cheese, because we hadn't had any in a while and it sounded good on this cold, snowy day.
And that's where the surprise came in. Connor and Sawyer usually eat just about any kind of macaroni and cheese, be it homemade or the kind from a box. Xander, however, never touches any of it. But I put some on his plate anyway, giving each of the boys the exact same thing. I'm nothing if not persistent, even after hundreds of refusals.
But then something amazing happened. He actually ate it.
To say I was surprised is an understatement. He's very particular about what he will allow in his mouth. I sometimes even have to force an unfamiliar piece of chocolate into his mouth just to get him to realize he does, in fact, like chocolate, even if he doesn't recognize the shape. He ate the macaroni like it was one of his usual staples - applesauce or yogurt. It just disappeared.
And then he looked up, said "More, please!" with the sign for "please" added on for good measure.
Wonders never cease.
