June is actually worse. I don't know the last time I was able to get a green vegetable inside her. She strategically avoids them, except to throw them off her plate. She will love one food one day and totally refuse it the next. Most of dinner time is spent listening to her cry because she is hungry but is refusing to eat what the rest of us are eating. Last night after several tantrums she cuddled and whimpered in my lap while licking and the spitting out her dinner. Almost every night after it all, I fill her up on yogurt and Cheerios. I don't know what else to do. She can't exactly be reasoned with yet and I am definitely not ready to send her to bed hungry because that will just mean an early or midnight wake-up for me to feed her.
Dinners have not been that pleasant lately between the two of them. Two nights ago was magical, somehow Willa forgot to complain and actually ate everything and asked for more. It was amazing. I just have to hold onto that beautiful memory now as Ryan and I try to eat amid the screaming.
On another note, June is expanding her vocabulary by leaps and bounds and sounds so adorable as she tries new words. The other day Willa was at preschool so I took June grocery shopping. She started toddling around saying "'nack 'nack" for snack. It was just so cute and I knew she was hungry so I got her a chocolate donut from the bakery to eat as she rode in the cart. I probably could have picked something healthier, but she probably would have refused it. This way I got to hear her cute voice say "num num num" with each bite. Soooo cute.
Read this forever ago, right when you posted, but didn't make time to comment. Coming back to it now because it is so nice to know that this is just the way it is for other people too. You hear about French toddlers and how they are so well mannered and eat everything served to them without a fuss and I want to pull my hair out. Anyway, we do this too. Eat what you're served or go to bed hungry. I'm guilty of not really making real food all that often, but even the easy meals aka "kid food" often gets snubbed. I used to offer a piece of bread as a substitute, but I'm done even doing that. What's on the table is what's available! I actually got a glimmer of success the other night when we were at a friend's house and we were served spicy chicken fajita quesadillas and Eddy came up and said quietly, "I don't want to eat this." We told him that was what was for dinner. He stood for a second, then took his plate back to his place and sat until the children were excused. The other parents watched (amused, thankfully) and said, "that's it?!" I suppose we can still work on the politeness but overall, from an almost-four year old it wasn't bad. And Davy didn't even try to get out of it. I'm sure they were both hungry that night, but no complaints. This is all to say, we're all in this together! We will conquer! We're doing just fine!
ReplyDeletePS, did you see that there is a sequel to "To All the Boys I've Loved Before" coming out soon? :)