ea ea ea!

I've been working later in the evenings to prepare for a big review at work in a few weeks. Unfortunately that means I've been missing Mae's dinner time more often than not. Fortunately, Dan has been handling it like a champ. He texted me this series of photos documenting Monday's dinner saga.

Mae walks in the door Monday evening, and all she can think about is when she will get to "EA! EA! EA!" (Never mind that she just had an afternoon snack). She announces "pate pate!" and collects her plate from the cabinet. Then she goes to the utensil drawer and begs for a "poooooh" until she receives a spoon (forks are dumb and everything should be eaten with a spoon). Dan appeases the hunger monster with a cheese stick appetizer and asks if she wanted to sit at her little table in the kitchen. All sorts of drama ensues, since the preferred seating location is clearly the "high chah, high chah."

A cheese stick buys about 5 minutes of peace before Mae starts asking for "mo? mo? MO? MO?" At this point, the pasta still has 4.5 minutes to go. This is the longest 4.5 minutes of her liiiiiiiife. The distraction-by-coloring technique is employed, and she goes through 4 sheets of paper, creating a masterpiece series that Dan has titled "a study in pasta." She takes the edge off the hunger by eating half a purple crayon.

Finally, dinner is served. Oh it's pasta? I guess she's not that hungry after all. A cup of milk and a fruit pouch, and she's on to the next thing... "PAY-DOH!"

Turns out the play-doh is just a short intermission, and she returns to the pasta after a quick "mee-mup" (clean up) of all the play-doh cutters. Then she kicks dada off the couch, curls up with the latest issue of National Geographic, and waits patiently for Mama to come home!