The Kitchen is CLOSED!!!!!

Rolling out the whole wheat dough that Warrior girl made on her own!!

"Wow Mom, these are REALLY GOOOOOD!!!"  She chose honey as her topping.

The finished product.  We used a small jar to form our biscuit circles and ended up making about 24 out of this recipe (you can find the whole wheat biscuit recipe at 100daysofrealfood.com)

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So instead of starting out my post sounding like Oscar the Grouch, I thought I would share my own little triumph-Warrior girl (who LOVES to cook and bake) helped me make whole wheat biscuit's for our Friday morning breakfast.  She is accomplished enough in the kitchen that she can be trusted with most equipment, so I turned her loose and she did a wonderful job.  She learned how to knead the dough and then got to use an old school wooden rolling pin-it honestly was fun!!!!!  The best part?  She LOVED the biscuits and encouraged her siblings to try them as well!!!  Honey was the favored topping and all of the kids came back for seconds, and thirds-they quickly disappeared. 

But why, you may wonder, am I crabby?  I will call my issue: the need to graze.  Before I share, here is my disclaimer: I know there are many different opinions on eating and children out there so let me reassure you- this is how I feel.  I am not judging nor do I honestly have any feelings about how you feed your own children.  Trust me, I learned long ago that judging is a bad idea (sometime I shall share my, "I will NEVER let my kids have a pacifier" story).  

 This past Thursday and Friday,  I started to notice that there was a lot of random grazing going on-especially right after a meal time.  This created a bad cycle-I eat breakfast and then I eat the fruit that is on the table and then I am not hungry at lunch but someone else is so Mom has to make lunch for others but not for me.  I am then hungry about 30 minutes after lunch is put away and expect all lunch items to come back out.  I am done eating lunch but now another little peep in my house wants a snack because they are STAAAAARVING as they rushed away from the table without finishing their food because they want to play.  Hey wait a minute-I think I"m hungry again so I'll ask for another snack which will make dinner unappealing because I'm not hungry.  Oh, by the way-it's an hour after dinner and since I didn't really want to eat because I had that other snack thing...I'm hungry again.

Perhaps this isn't a familiar scenario.  Well let me tell you-it about pushed me over the edge on Friday!!!  I do not mind preparing meals and providing a snack, but on Thursday afternoon and Friday throughout the day I was in our kitchen constantly!!!!  Like more than normal (which is typically a lot!)!!!   It was, quite frankly, ridiculous!!!  So being the routine/system minded gal that I am, here is what I instituted:

If you are a member of the Story household, you will be offered the following:  breakfast where we all eat together;  lunch where we all eat together; a snack around 3:00; dinner where we all eat together; and depending on what time dinner has been served, there is a possible snack that could be offered in the evening (p.s.-this evening option will not be made public knowledge).   If you choose not to eat at a set meal time, then you will be hungry enough to eat at the next meal time.  In between said times, the KITCHEN IS CLOSED!!!!!  Of course water is always available since it is smoking hot outside.  I don't think that this is mean-I think that this is reasonable.  The snacking is honestly causing a problem-even if it is healthy!!!!  We will see what happens.

On to the week-I am now adding in all "real" lunches!!  June first is just a mere 4 days away and I'm not sure that I am fully ready!!!!!    Again you may notice that the breakfast choices are familiar-I'm sticking to what the kids like!!  Lunches are also not that exciting, but keeping it simple is really what is working around here!!

Monday

• Breakfast - Breakfast bites, fruit
• Lunch -      Salad, hard boiled eggs, fruit

Tuesday

• Breakfast - Pumpkin bread, yogurt
• Lunch -      Grilled cheese (using whole wheat bread and "good" cheese)

Wednesday

• Breakfast - Pecan breakfast cookies (these didn't go over well last time, but I'm trying again!!)
• Lunch -      PBJ sandwiches, fruit, veggies

Thursday

• Breakfast - Fruit smoothies, toast with peanut butter or jelly (I'm going to add spinach today!!)
• Lunch -      Crackers, cheese, hummus, veggies

Friday, June 1st-Food Revolution (plus "rules" begin)

• Breakfast - Scrambled eggs, toast, and fruit
• Lunch -      Caprese pasta salad (new recipe for us to try-check it out at 100days)
• Dinner -     Sandwiches (we have dance recital rehearsal all day so it has to be EASY!!) and veggies

Saturday

• Breakfast - French toast (yes it's legal-we cut out brown sugar and replace with honey)
• Lunch -      Cheese, crackers, fruit, peanut butter to dip and/or hummus
• Dinner -     Grilled chicken, veggies

Sunday (Dance recital crazy day!!)

• Breakfast -  Smoothies, toast  
• Lunch -       Salad with left over grilled chicken
• Dinner -      Grilled cheese or whole wheat pasta-we will be exhausted so this will be whatever is easiest!!!

Whew-long post!!!!  I'll be sharing the "rules" in the next few days as I gear up for the "Story Family Food Revolution" as we go all in!!  I am still confidently sharing that while this is hard, it is worth it 100%!!!  So whether you make little changes or big, congratulations to you for doing something awesome for your family!!!