Oh Sweet Child o' Mine...

As her mother and the person who "made" her, I have total rights to bragging, so... after dinner tonight, I just had to "blog" her. She is a pretty unique kid in that she will eat very "grown up" and healthy food and usually prefers it to junk food or sweets (except chocolate - that's the only way I know she's really mine!) I always feel so sorry for my friends who have to make 2 options at every meal-time (one for the adults and a separate bland boring dinner for the kids.) Grace eats and always has eaten whatever we choose to eat. And, if you know us well, we don't usually eat foods that kids would like. I remember when she was just over one year old, we were eating chinese food and she went to town on my cashew chicken and rice. Tonight for dinner, we had cod with spicy mango salsa (cod caught fresh by our neighbor Roger in the Atlantic), greek roasted potatoes, and asparagus. Most kids would look at that and immediately ask for Mac and Cheese or a chicken nugget. Not Grace. She ate a good portion of the cod and roasted potatoes and chomped through 4 asparagus stalks like they were candy canes. Earlier today, we were out shopping (at the one shopping strip within 20 minutes of our house) and she got hungry. There was a health food store nearby and I asked her if she wanted to go in and get a snack. She agreed, so we proceeded in the store. She passed up some cheese puffs (organic cheese puffs?), some chocolate bars, and several other snack options. We came to the produce aisle and she said "I want pink bell carrots." (pink bell for Tinkerbell who also enjoys carrots for a snack.) Unbelievably, they didn't have any carrots at the HEALTH FOOD store, so we left empty handed. When we got home she ate half a bag of baby carrots.

Of course, she will eat mac and cheese and a chicken nugget and fries when offered to her, but they are hardly the substance of her diet like they are for most kids. I can't really claim that it has anything to do with my parenting skills. She is just a cool kid on her own. I think she was born with a craving for good food. When I was pregnant with her I always craved fruits and vegetables that I wouldn't usually eat in that frequency and I regularly turned down dessert which is definitely not me.

She's just a mystery to me sometimes. You might think from this picture that she has sweet little curls that she has in cute pigtails with bows all the time. Really, she just likes to have the curlers in her hair, but won't let me brush it on a daily basis, much less put cute bows and barrettes in it. She usually has what she calls "crazy hair" and loves it that way. I was always bugged by little girls I saw in stores or at church who hadn't had anything done with their hair, but now I'm not so judgemental.

I'm not quite sure who I'm raising, but I really like her and she's taught me a lot about being an individual and not doing things just because other people do. She definitely does what she wants to do almost 100% of the time yet she does it (and I quote from another parent who sees her a lot) without being tyrranical about it.
I can't wait to see what her little sister has in store for us!