Step into my lunch

Today was a pretty typical lunchtime with both kids at home.  Lottie wanted soup and Dallas requested a hot dog.  Easy enough, right?  Ha.

As soon as Lottie saw her soup, she complained that she had asked for vegetable beef soup, not chicken noodle soup.  Dallas then clamored for chicken noodle soup as well, but he can't have it because the noodles are made with eggs.  I split time trying to tell Lottie that the soup was more than acceptable AND that she hadn't actually requested vegetable beef soup, and then I had to explain the whole egg-noodle thing to Dallas.  That didn't go so well.  He was still smarting from the fact that I had had the audacity to run out of strawberry jelly in the morning, so he couldn't have more toast.  Bad move, Mommy.  

Lottie grudgingly ate a teeny bit of the soup and Dallas devoured his hot dog.  I made myself a pb&j sandwich, only to have Lottie longingly gaze at it like it was a cool drink of water in the desert.  I sighed and gave her my sandwich.  I got up to make another one for myself, but Dallas interrupted my task by asking where was lunch: spaghetti and meatballs.  Um, huh?  When I made that, at Dallas's request, for dinner last night, he threw a fit and said spaghetti was slimy like a snake.  Oooookay....

There are microwave packets of pasta made by Allergaroo that don't contain any of the eight major food allergens: dairy, egg, wheat, soy, fish, shellfish, peanuts, and tree nuts.  I always have quite a few of those on hand, so I popped one of those in the microwave for Dallas.  While I waited for that to heat, Lottie expressed a need to eat some peanut butter and jelly crackers.  I made those, cut up Dallas's spaghetti, and delivered the food to the table.  Then both kids needed more to drink, so back to the kitchen I went.  I returned the cups of water to the kidlets and tucked a paper towel in Dallas's shirt to try to keep the spaghetti off of him.  Mr. Persnickety hates being dirty.   By the time I walked around the table and sat down at my seat to start my lunch, Dallas had ripped off the paper towel claiming that it hurt him.  I shrugged and bit into my sandwich.  Before I could swallow that first bite, Dallas held up his hands to show me the spaghetti sauce on them and demanded another paper towel...a fresh paper towel.  Sigh.  The new paper towel was tucked in just in time for Dallas to tell me that he wanted more spaghetti.  He had sucked up every last bite in about ninety seconds.  I made him more spaghetti, ran upstairs to get a new shirt because - gasp! - there was a speck of spaghetti sauce on it, came back downstairs, put the new shirt on Dallas, tucked the paper towel back in, and finally sat down to eat.  

Throughout all of the up and down, there was a constant flow of chatter.  Those kids talked and talked and talked.  They didn't even really talk to each other, though; they talked OVER each other about completely different topics.  Lottie talked about Halloween, and Dallas talked about his friend the pirate.  So much talking.  Ooodles of words.  Lots of bold, weird statements.  It's enough to make anyone's head spin.   Or wish for a Xanax prescription.  But I know there is a day in the not-too-distant future when I'll be sitting alone at the dining room table in a quiet house while both kids are in school.  I'm sure I'll enjoy the first few minutes of eating my own lunch without having to jump up and get a napkin or water or more chicken nuggets; however, I also know I'll miss their sweet faces and their laughter.  So I think I'll enjoy the insanity while I can.  

(**The kids have paint on their faces, by the way.  Dallas does NOT have a black eye.  Just wanted to clarify.  No need to call Child Services.  Thanks.)