The Kitchen

A little while ago someone asked me if I liked to cook. 

I did...then I had two kids.  I feel like I spend my life in the kitchen.  I'm never NOT there.  

1. When I get up in the morning the first thing I do is make breakfast for myself and the kids. 
2. I clean up breakfast.
3. I finish making their lunches and my lunches.  Even if I have made lunches the night before there's still filling up water bottles, putting lunches in backpacks, etc.
4. If there's time I load the dishwasher.
5. When I get home I make a snack for the kids.
6. The kids unload their backpacks but I put all the Tupperware into the dishwasher.  
7. I look in their lunch boxes and see, once again, a clean napkin.  Does anyone else wonder how many days a child can go without using the napkin in his/her lunchbox?
8. I clean up snack.
9. It's usually about 4:00ish by now.  At about 5:00 or 5:15 I start making dinner.
10. Dinner is ready at 6:00.  We eat and then I clean up from dinner.
11. After the kids are in bed I collapse on the couch for an hour or so and about 9:00 or 10:00 p.m. I start making lunches again for the next day.
12. There are other kitchen chores such as loading and unloading the dishwasher, putting away the groceries, washing the refrigerator shelves, rearranging our always over-stuffed freezer, baking with the kids, sweeping, mopping, washing the counters, cleaning the sink, and the never-ending quest to find the Tupperware lid that goes to the Tupperware that has no lid.

I have a friend with eight children.  I really wonder how she ever leaves the kitchen.

I cannot wait until my kids are teenagers.  I'll be broke from the grocery bills but at least they'll live on microwaveable pizza that they can make themselves.  

The Change From Compassion to Brutality

A couple of weeks ago Jeff was reading a story.

"Daddy, this is so sad!" he said.

"What?" I asked.

"A hunter shot Babar's mother and now she's dead."

(Note to self: maybe look at some of the books that were written a generation or two ago before leaving them out for the kids to read.)

"I would never shoot an animal," Jeff continued.  "That not a nice thing to do."

My mind flashed an image of our disgusting president's son next to his kill.  It made me wonder what he was like as a child.  I can't imagine any five year old rooting for a hunter to shoot and kill an animal in a book.  It made me wonder what changes that sweet, innocent, compassionate child and allows him or her to grow up wanting to put a bullet into an animal's head.  Or worse. 

Kids in school and online are teased, bullied, beaten up, etc.  I hope that I have done everything in my power to make my children be the ones who don't tease, bully or beat up others.  When I look at the world today - brutal dictators around the world, ethnic cleansing, anti-Semitic and racist graffiti - I hope my children are the ones who help eradicate that kind of behavior and work towards a more peaceful and accepting world.  I'm trying my best and, from what I have seen, they will exceed my expectations.