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Grandchildren
arrive. 3/3/06 |
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On 3rd of March I drive about a hundred miles to pick up the grand-children for a 3
week holiday with us. Unfortunately the weather had been
atrocious and was not set to get any better! I left at 5am in
a snow storm. The main roads near us were not bad, however I
quickly found a 20 mile stretch of awful road. The ruts in the
slush had frozen and the car didn't want to stay in or out of them,
so it was pretty hairy. Car Journey I'm glad to say that the return journey, although still very cold, -3 by the time we got home (I had set out in -5) was much better, all of the roads bar our track, were black. The kids were great on the journey, despite having already been travelling by car for 12 hours, they chatted (incessantly lol) all the way home, which was great as it gave me a chance to get used to their accent again. We played a game when we noticed the first road sign with our town name on it and it was 90 odd miles, where we would guess what the mileage would be on the next sign. I was delighted to find that there was no need for the bucket, towels and flannels their Mum had suggested I take. There was no word of either child being sick at all. Kids that hate food I plan, while I have the children, to try and improve their eating habits. They won't try anything new and have lived on junk food for so long they are conditioned to it. Their Mum has had enough warning about this that she has been experimenting and trying to get them to eat other things in readiness for their holiday but was not having much luck. Lunch on the way back up the road was the start. I don't know what the children like or dislike, when I asked Mum what they disliked she said "food". So, I made egg sandwiches. The children would be looking after the chickens, they knew that and were looking forward to it, so I thought if I have a chance, maybe they would eat eggs, after all they would be collecting them soon! Anyway, both kids took a sandwich, took a sniff and gave them back. There was nothing for them to eat - very much on purpose. When we reached a village, my Grandson asked me if there was a cafe there, I told him "yes" he suggested we go there to eat. I explained that we had eaten as much as we wanted, we had had our lunch, and drove on home. They did well, they didn't complain. There was lots of discussion about how they didn't like eggs, and I explained that that was ok, they didn't have to eat them, but there was nothing else until the next meal. Gosh, talk about "hard", I'm a real bitch! When we got home, the food issue came up again. rofl They asked for a slice of dry bread!!! I couldn't keep it up and learnt a very valuable lesson right away! I decided they could have a slice of toast with jam and a banana but nothing else until dinner. I finished the apricot jam on Grand-daughter (GD) and had to use some lime marmalade on Grandson's (GS) toast. He didn't like the colour. When they had finished, I discovered a very neatly scraped off pile of marmalade on the floor of the kitchen under his chair. Oh Dear! I cried, you must have spilt your jam, you should have told me so we could clean it up. That was the last meal they ate on their own. I had been dodging back and fore trying to put away shopping, etc. More organised now, believe me. Snow The snow at home was about 5 inches deep and the kids were desperate to get out into it. I couldn't believe how hard it was to get them to put their coats on! GS came and asked me, obviously not expecting the answer he got, if he would be allowed to make Snow Angels, I said "yes, of course", "but won't I get dirty?" he replied, "so we wash your clothes" I said. He was delighted and promptly ran outside to make snow angels. We started to build a fort, but I had loads to do and wasn't managing much time on it to help. We had a great snowball fight though. It was just like playing half life, I couldn't hit him at all! lol Fortunately Granddad arrived home and helped out with the fort until dark and snow storms drove them indoors. When I went out to take the photo's, it had brick walls! Snow bricks that is!
Dinner Time/Rules The kids were really shattered and the roast chicken I had planned on feeding them was not going to be ready in time. They liked beans but I only had Tikka Mean Beanz. GS had told me earlier that GD like curry so I thought they would be fine as these were not hot, just different and GS was determined that that was what he wanted. So, I told them the rules one more time to be sure they understood:
Basically, it went slightly wrong the first night because I let them have the extras before they finished what was on their plate but I have sorted that now. But the upshot was, GS discovered he liked bacon, and they both like the mean beanz. They both decided not to finish their small plateful and that's all they had. Goodness I felt so mean, but one thing I had learnt with my own kids was follow through. If you don't then you lose control. I had said these were the rules and it had to be that way from the start. |
| Day Two - 4/3/06 |
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Breakfast The kids woke up at 7:30 and crept downstairs ever so quietly and turned on the TV quietly. Where we live it is so quiet that the slightest noise wakes me, so I jumped out of bed, bullied Granddad into getting up as well and went downstairs to make breakfast. I didn't ask the children what they wanted. I made the breakfast and if they didn't eat it they were waiting until lunch time. I made them porridge (syrup swirl) with banana cut up into it and more banana in a plate on the table. I did one pack between them and had to do another one as they enjoyed it so much. We don't have sweet biscuits unless we have visitors. Another rule. I make them up as I go along but am sticking to them rigidly. They are also not allowed tea at night. But I gave them tea in the morning, although GS kept stirring his as the 1/2 sugar couldn't have melted (even though it was extra sweet because it was brown sugar! lol) as it didn't taste like the 3 sugars he would get at home. Daughter is going to have to buy some brown sugar if she want to keep his intake down. lol Half way through the morning we gave the kids juice or milk and oatcakes! They love oatcakes too.
Today we went to town, they had their holiday pocket money and the money from their wall charts. They both knew what they wanted, GD didn't have quite enough and GS couldn't get his. As we planned to take them to the big city the following weekend, I suggested they have 50p to buy sweeties as it was Saturday and they saved it until the next Saturday. Good kids, they both thought that was a good idea and happily bought their sweeties. Needless to say, by bedtime they were as high as kites especially as they ended up eating multi coloured ice lollies later on in the day! Lunchtime I made them burger rolls. Home made burgers. GS wanted cheese on his so I did that, I also put a slice of tomato on each of them. Neither of them liked tomato. They were given 1/2 burger roll each and the second half was put on the table along with the organic yoghurts. Well, you would think I was asking them to eat sand! lol We found ourselves sort of bargaining with them at first, then I remembered how Super Nanny says, no, the rule is the rule and that is it! They both ate their half roll. I had given in so far as saying that if they ate their half roll they could take the tomato off of their second half. Both kids had their yoghurts and were very happy. Meal was eaten within 20 mins too. However, I would like to say that there was always one of us with the children at all times and that we could see quite clearly if they tried to "disappear" anything.
Both kids were a delight, GD (6 years old) read me a whole ready book then proceeded to read 3 more to herself. GS read me a chapter of his book. GD drew some lovely pictures and GS went out with Granddad and finished building the igloo which had started life as a fort on day one. Again I kept finding them with no coats on! They were freezing too. Little horrors. As you can see in the photo, this is when they had their brightly coloured ice lollies.
Dinner Time GS had told me that he didn't like chicken but that if he could have beanz with it, he could mix them together and eat it that way. The dinner plates went on the table. GD didn't like carrot, neither had had parsnip "chips" before, they both liked mash and neither wanted gravy. GD ate hers and pointed out to us that she had eaten all of her carrot and her parsnip chips that she wasn't that keen on. She had extra mash and chicken. GS explained very politely that he didn't like chicken and he had had a pudding at lunch time and was quite happy not to have one tonight so he wasn't going to eat his chicken, just his beans. Now that wasn't on, especially after it he suggested that he have beans to help his chicken down! I made a mistake then but realised it quite quickly. I told him that as he had said that he would eat the chicken if he could have beans and now wasn't going to do it, he wouldn't get beans again. That was not a sensible thing to say, because beans are an awful handy thing to have and they are low GI and reasonably healthy. So, I took his plate, cut up his chicken, mixed it with his beans and fed him! He's 9! He let me feed him! His sister was hilarious and told us that her 4 year old cousin got fed once. Then said "at least you aren't doing aeroplanes with him" lol As soon as I got him eating, we talked about igloos and things we had done and were planning to do to try and take his mind off of what he was eating. It worked perfectly and both hubby and I are convinced that he was actually enjoying his food.
Another funny thing that came out of this meal was the discussion about how things were not always horrible tasting, just different and that he was quite liking some things like bacon and that, and that he didn't mind trying new things (he just doesn't at home) but could we not tell his mum. We are allowed to tell her that he ate all of his food but not what it was, except we could tell her he liked bacon! lol Granddad read them their bed time story this time and then GS (because he is older) was allowed to come downstairs and play Granddads racing game for 1/2 hour before he goes to bed. They both played in bed (leap pad and gameboy) until about 9:30 then went to sleep. It was a lovely day and a good food day too. I'm sure there will be set backs but so far I think we are winning. |
