So middle child, Mental, starts screeching "no, no, I hate hot dogs, I don't want any!" like I'd just requested a kidney off him.
I asked "but not even just the frankfurter? Its hot dogs in proper hot dog rolls?!" (Once I ran out of long hot dog rolls, and they ended up with frankfurters in baps instead, which was apparently the most treacherous thing you could do with frankfurters even though it was still bread but the wrong shape!), you know, just trying to cajole him into eating the same thing as everyone else - I'd had eldest off school sick for 2 days, had spent an inordinate amount of time scrubbing spew out of the new Solar System bedroom rug, and had been traipsing to and fro the vets with a sick kitten so really, I just wanted for once to make 4 of the same things instead of one Nutella sandwich without butter, one cheese spread sandwich WITH butter and one without butter, and a jam sandwich (always with butter, who could eat a jam butty without butter?!). But noooo.......he wanted a butty instead (Nutella, no butter, just incase you were wondering, although I'm sure you weren't, but I'm nothing if not thorough).
So I duly made his requested butty/sandwich/sarnie (depending on whereabouts you're from) and made hot dogs for the rest of us. As it turns out, I only had enough rolls for 3 of us so I thought that it was quite handy actually. So I sat down to eat my only meal of the day of 2 hotdogs. One bite. That was all I had. One poxy bite. I was STARVING. Well, I wasn't starving as in the actual definition of the word to be honest, as I've got enough fat reserves to keep a small village in Alaska going for the winter, but you know, I was pretty hungry!
Mental looked at my plate and started to sob......upon asking what the random outburst of crying was for, I was then told that he didn't know it was THOSE hotdogs! 'Those' hotdogs being normal frankfurters in normal hot dog rolls, rolls that were the right shape and not baps, which were the wrong shape and made hot dogs inedible (apparently).
So I stared down at my 1 and 7/8ths of hotdogs left on my plate and forced myself to say "fine. Do you want my hotdogs?".
Never have I so wanted him to say "oh no Mummy, of course not, I'm perfectly full up on my butty of Nutella and no butter, you haven't eaten all day, please go ahead and enjoy the fruits of your labour".....or even a "oh thank you so much kind and generous Mummy, I'd quite like one but you MUST have the other!".
Needless to say he did not say either of those things and I handed over my plate, as all Mums would do of course. I felt a moment of pride for doing such a selfless thing when I had hunger pangs so bad it felt like a rat was gnawing on my insides, and then I thought...."Well, I'd best order myself a Dominos when the kids are in bed then!"
Mine went through a stage of doing that too. I have now, possibly to my detriment, a routine where I show all of my ingredients to ,whatever I am making, just to avoid such dilemmas. Not that I would recommend that to everyone, it makes the joys of cooking so much longer for me, but it can solve some situations.
On a plus side; was the Dominos nice?
You have ingredients?! That involves cooking! My kids won't eat my cooking lol. On the odd occasion I can persuade them to have pasta and something, I have to make 4 different styles, with cheese, without cheese, with tomato sauce AND cheese, with Pesto and cheese....and then when they get it they say things like "oh, you mean THAT sauce?! Yeah, I wanted that too..."
When it comes to my children everything is shown and yes ingredients!! being from breakfast cereal to a sandwich and then cooking! (Because obviously Daddy swaps the contents of the cereal box in between showing them the box and pouring it into a bow, obviously I have nothing better to do than tricking my children as often as l can) So yes, show them the ingredients it adds a couple of minutes to each meal time but actually saves a good 10 minutes of fall out. So I fully appreciate the banging your head against the wall...I'm hoping and praying that they will grow out of this!