Scooby Doo is Gabe's role model. Particularly his eating habits. Like most four year olds, he has few favorite foods (mostly PB &J and yogurt) and anything outside of that is considered evil alien food with which mom is trying to secretly poison him. But, if I tell him it is a "Scooby Snack" he will try just about anything.
Recently, food has become an even greater source of make-believe delight. It began with the plastic kitchen Quin received for Christmas. Now he and Quin delight in whipping us up batches of "cookies", "cakes", and "cheese sandwiches". The added bonus of this activity is that they both go upstairs to their play room for at least 5 minutes at a time! This is an unprecidented ability to not play directly under my feet and I am truly grateful for the five minutes in which I can watch a movie without the subtitles! (These are movies which are filmed in English, people! Need I say more? You can't imagine how excited we were when we discovered this trick and watched the first movie through in three years without rewinding 27 times just to see what critical piece of dialogue we had missed. Plot continuity; its a good thing.)
Now Gabe frequently requests a new Scooby Doo treat: "Double Dipped Marshmellow Fudge Sandwich" (followed by a slurping/smacking sound, just like Shaggy). The problem here: I am one of "those moms" who doesn't allow the routine ingestion of sugar, chocolate, marshmellows and the like (at least not by the kids!). So, I simply make him a peanut butter and jelly (#2087) and we discuss how marvelously gooey the marshmellow (peanut butter) is and how fantastically drippy the fudge ( all-fruit-natural-granola-ass-jelly) is. He likes it when I garnish it with a piece of fruit and stack it up just so. Then he joyously announces, Shaggy style: "Through the teeth and over the gums, watch out stomach, here it comes!"
Who says you can't learn anything watching television? What, do you want him to have no pop culture references? Jeez! Look at all that imagination he is using! He's a phenom!
I'm a bad granola mom.
1 comment:
"sugar, chocolate, and marshmallows..."
so... um... sugar?
Scooby Doo does rule. Gabe's just smart for figuring it out early.
You gotta know there's some goodness left in the world when pop culture still includes retro-dressing crime-fighting teenagers in a flower van lamely named "Mystery Machine" with talking dogs and the occasional rock video.
Seriously, how many things like this can you truly share with your children? I totally remember watching Scooby Doo when I was a kid followed by the Dukes of Hazzard (Luke Duke was my first crush), and then we'd play Bo's version of "Love Me Tender" on the record player and then Donna Summer.
Someday, it will be neat to fondly remember Scooby episodes with your son.
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