Tuesday, October 5, 2010

The Food Cure

My blogging friend, DeeDee (of Fiddledeedee fame!) asked on her blog about fruit and vegetables. Namely what fruits and vegetables my children will eat without coercion. Before I share, I have to share a story.

When I was first pregnant with my oldest, who is now 10 (and as she is quick to remind me, "almost 10.5!"), I craved salads from Subway.  And since I drove past Subway twice a day on my way to and from work, I ate a lot of salad the first three months of my pregnancy. For the remaining six months, I existed on Chips Ahoy and Pepsi. And it wasn't that Diet Pepsi junk either. Nope, full sugar, full caffeine.

When I was pregnant with my youngest, soon to be 8, I didn't have the salad cravings. In fact I can't really remember having any cravings with her at all.  There were things I ate often, but I'm not sure it was a craving.

We have a video of Elizabeth, my youngest, opening her stocking on Christmas morning and exclaiming, "Lookit! I got chock-it!" You can hear my voice telling her "only one piece", you can hear Dear Man's voice saying, "only one piece" and then you can see her, deer in the headlights look, cheeks stuffed with the forbidden chock-it, and another piece of chock-it in each hand.  She was going to have "only one"...at a time.

A few years later, when offered a piece of candy for a snack, my oldest would say, "But, Momma, can't I have some fruit?" And when offered a piece of fruit, my youngest would say, "How 'bout some chock-it?"

Ariana has never met a fruit she didn't like. She is not as hip on vegetables but put fresh vegetables in a salad and she is all over it!

It took Elizabeth a few years to like salad. Her favorite comment when salad was on the menu, "But Momma, you knoooowwwww it's not my favorite." I'm not sure what changed for her, but now she is giddy with excitement when it is. She has also come a long way toward liking fruit.

We are a fruit-loving family. And is it any wonder really?
I went down to the garden of nuts to see the fruits
Song of Songs 6:12 kjv

1 comment:

  1. For my kids, it's bananas and grapes - but my son is more of a fruit-eater in general.

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