This is the way we make our food...make our food...make our food

So it is now a habit. If you do something for so long, it is no longer just something you're trying out but is not an ingrained part of who you are and what you do. So it is with our kids and dinner. of course, they want to eat it, but more significant is that they MUST help make it.

Let me paint a picture for you (with words, of course, because Karl gets to do all the actual painting in our house). It is four o'clock in the afternoon and tummies are just starting to rumble with the "what's for dinner" bass line. I try to get the kids to play with toys in the living room because I'm still in denial about how many people it takes to make dinner. This week I pulled out marbleworks - an all time favorite for everyone - and even it didn't keep the kids occupied for long once they realized what I was doing in the kitchen. Speaking of the kitchen, if you haven't been to our house, it's not what you would call a modern kitchen with tons of counter space.  In fact, 90% of the cooking occurs on the stretch of counter between the stove and sink. However, when June and Ruben help me cook, that surface area is cut by two thirds leaving me about one square foot of working space. The kids sit on the counter for the duration of the cooking unless I'm using the burners closer to the counter. Then June hauls out the step stool to stand in front of the stove so she can watch. I'm sure you're thinking, wait, go back...you leave your kids on the counter.  Have you met Ruben? How does he stay put? The answer is, I don't really know, but no one has yet fallen off the counter even though I'm not shy about walking around the kitchen to collect supplies. Then I proceed to attempt to make dinner in my one square foot of counter space while keeping Ruben from pulling out knives from the knife block or convincing June that this really is a task that only Mom can do (like using the big knives...June does have her own little knife and helps out when there are easy veggies to cut up)

 
 Somehow or another we manage to end up with a very edible meal. I will warn you, though, if you come over to dinner, there's a chance the food has been well tested during the cooking process...

As a side note, we were making chocolate eclair torte in these photos. I love this dessert, but I can tell how little white flour/white sugar/processed food we eat on a regular basis, because after a piece of this delicious dessert, I was tasting the chemicals and not so much the deliciousness. There are very few regrets when you make healthy change in your life, but losing chocolate eclair torte may very well be one of them.