All You Can Eat….

Usually on a night where the kids have an activity, I feed them dinner before we leave the house.

When the activity falls at 4pm, we have a light snack before leaving the house and then I load a giant, ridiculously awkward cooler bag to drag along with us and I fill it with two thermoses containing a hot dish (despite having three children), fruit, vegetables (these go virtually untouched but it makes me look like a good mother), crackers (these go first and the container is licked free of salt) and something resembling a treat (a cookie or two jelly beans each which are always the impetus for this conversation at 3:30pm en route to the activity, “Can we have the cookie now?” “Can we have the jelly bean now?” “One jelly bean?” “Half?” “If you don’t let me eat this cookie right now, I will never talk to you again and I won’t love you ever again!” (Ahh Chloe)

Last night, I had a different idea. Why don’t we have a fruit smoothie at home before leaving for our activity and then we’ll hit the new all-you-can-eat sushi place on the way home? Everyone was on board.

When we arrived at the restaurant, the kids were famished.

I started ordering; California rolls, crab tempura rolls, shrimp tempura, salmon teriyaki, rice etc. The kids’ eyes lit up with excitement when some of their favourites started to arrive at the table.

Then our server said quietly, “If you don’t eat everything, we’ll have to charge you for it.”

It was an understandable request. It prevents people from over-indulging (more so than you’re already planning to at a place boasting “All You Can Eat!”)

Understandable to adults but my kids became immediately frightened at the prospect of this meal costing their parents any more than whatever we had clearly, silently agreed to when perusing the menu.

If Chloe didn’t finish something, Ellie would say, “Chloe, pass me your plate and I’ll eat that pea.”

Hanna said, “Mommy, are you going to eat all of the chicken?” (I wasn’t). She jammed one chopstick into a small piece of teriyaki chicken and force-fed herself while massaging her neck so it would go down her gullet like a dog taking a vitamin.

Chloe didn’t care at all. She pushed food aside and focused on a bowl of steamed rice.

Ellie whispered, “Stop eating rice. It’s cheap. It doesn’t matter if we have to pay more for that. Start eating the crab rolls Chloe. Start eating them NOW!”

This lovely idea of eating out and treating ourselves to some favourite foods suddenly became hostile and there were many trips to the bathroom by our three kids.

I have no idea if they were sneaking food away from the table and disposing of it in another room.

I know Chloe was just following along to be part of the gang.

Pockets full of white rice and a big smile on her face.

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