LandfallVoyages

Mom, do I really have to eat this thing?

You can try and hammer common sense into your kids until you’re blue in the face. Past a certain point they selectively filter out our voices and anything that actually gets through sounds like the grownups on a Peanuts cartoon. Parents, you know what I’m talking about. It’s a fact, they’ve done studies–sometimes, kids have to learn stuff on a more visceral level. I can’t remember exactly how old Eli was when he learned the Too Much Sugar Will Make You Feel Like Crap lesson. I think it was at his friend Keenan’s 7th or 8th birthday party when we finally got fed up with fielding the constant—–  hang on…

Eli just poked his head around the computer to see what I was doing and gave me one of those ugh, gotta bail out the old people again  looks. I think he learned that from his Uncle Chad. Anyway, he says the perfect way to describe it is like this: Take your kids to a birthday party and let them eat every bit of sugar there is. Encourage them, give them double helpings of whatever they want, and then gently hold their hair when they puke it all up later on. And tell them I told you so. Yeah, sometimes parents suck 😉

He learned that particular lesson so well that he’s actively managed his own sugar intake ever since. We unearthed a truly Jurassic Doughnut while laying over in Channel Islands Harbor and while Eli ate only a modest portion of the darn thing, all the grownups present ate ummm… rather more than that. I guess I have to admit that Eli did warn me in advance. He was all, “Mom, you know you’re just gonna feel crappy if you eat that.” And I was all rolling my eyes at him and going “Hush child. I’m the grownup and I know exactly what I’m doing!”

I will admit to a moderately queasy feeling in the stomachular region. He didn’t say, “I told you so.” But he did offer me some ginger to quiet the gastric rebellion playing out in my stomach.

Kids grow up really fast. Just saying.