Yuck!

Today had the initial appearances of a day of doom: Isaac's cold keeps on lingering, and Bella was near tears from the get-go: She's in a growth spurt (physical and emotional), and has a VERY short fuse. All week, she's been grabbing pen and paper and starting art right away in the morning, and that was NOT cutting it for her today. So it was time for some Daddy one-on-one.

We went off to Edinborough Park for an hour of getting the ya-yas out (along with half of the kids in the 55435 zip code as well), then to Bachmans for a stroll in the greenhouse and a quiche lunch. She ate the whole quiche this time, meaning she's storing up for construction. She decided that since it was almost Valentine's Day, we should get something nice for Mommy: She picked out an insane pink bromiliad, but was talked into a less flashy orange one by the checkout lady (the pink one was almost dead, which explains the fullness of its bloom, I suppose). Bella's mood was quite light by this point and we were having a great time.

When we got home, no friends were available to play, so we took on some projects: Pamela got out her Valentines and got her to sign them all... then it was off to the basement to watch me ROCK OUT on Rock Band, and then we relaxed to the final hour of the Ekanuba Dog Show, which had Bella yelling out "I want THAT DOG... and THAT ONE TOO!!!"

So here's the fun story: We had baked curry chicken breasts stuffed with veggies for dinner. Bella was ADAMANT she wanted nothing to do with this food. So we gave her some rice, and a few cut up pieces of chicken on her plate, just in case she wanted to give the food a TRY.

(Full disclosure: While Bella has some unique things she loves - Tacos, Bean Burrito, Pad Thai, Spinach Quiche, Tortellini - she is very resistant to trying new things. So we are "incenting" (bribing) her: If she tries 10 new things, she'll get a new Webkin. Think what you want - it's working for us).

So we tell her just to try ONE bite of the chicken. She sits in a huff for a while, then grabs the smallest possible sub-fragment of chicken she can find, pops it into her mouth and yells "YUCK!!!!". We thanked her for at least trying - and hey, maybe the curry was a bit spicy.

A moment later, she grabs another tiny piece and says "I'm just going to try one more tiny piece". Pops it in. YUCK. Pamela and I exchange glances, and decide to let this pass without comment.

She spears a more normal sized piece with her fork and says "I'm going to see if this MEDIUM piece is the same". Pops it in, and says "EEEEYUCK!!!!" And proceeds to eat all of the rest of the chicken on her plate, while saying YUCK after each bite.

Emboldened, I take a piece and dip it into the mango chutney, which she grabs and says "Yuck... AND TOO SPICY". So I offer up a big piece without any chutney, "just to take away that spicy flavor". Again, "Yuck". By this point, Pamela and I are doing every thing we can do to keep from breaking out in laughter. She asks Pamela to cut her some more of that Chicken.

Now thinking about that Webkin (since she got Curry Chicken AND Mango Chutney added to the list), she decides to try chicken and rice ON THE SAME FORK AT THE SAME TIME. Perhaps sensing that the jig is up on Yuck, she decides she's full after another bite or 2. So in the end, she Yucked her way through a half of a chicken breast....

We then retired to the living room and played around 75 hands of Go Fish, with her beating me almost every time.

Yuck number 2 is that Isaac's cold has now moved to his chest, and he's been waking up all evening with a rasping cough that has him short of breath and scared. I've already done one nebulizer on him, but it's more flemmy than asthma. And he's up again, so here's where my post ends.