Dinner at the Morphet's House

Dinner at our house usually consists of one meal for adults, one meal for sensory daughter who accepts only certain things, and another meal for autistic son on the GFCF diet.  And there are traditionally only 4 of us.  For those who are rolling their eyes, and thinking "Not in my house."  I ask you to kindly come over and try Sophia out for size some time.

I don't let her eat junk (at least not a lot) but her variety is very limited.  And eating only what she wants would bore me quite a bit - meatballs and various pastas, mac n cheese, french fries, PB & J, pizza, grilled cheese, chicken strips or nuggets, ham, bacon, eggs, mashed potatoes, yogurt, British beans, nuts of all types (raw and roasted), raisins, bread, waffles, pancakes, carrot sticks, OJ, cranberry juice, tomato juice, milk, water and the occasional celery, apple, raspberries, bananas, strawberries, watermelon, cantaloupe, and orange.  Needless to say I sneak some veggies into her via sweet treats like pumpkin muffins, zucchini bread, squash rolls, spinach brownies.  I use alternative flours that add some nutritional variety like brown rice, quinoa, garbanzo bean, fava bean, tapioca.  She takes a multivitiamin, probiotics, and fish oil supplement (Omega 3/6 blend).  We don't drink soda (diet or regular), we make a lot of our sweet treats from scratch - including homemade ice cream, cookies, cakes, cupcakes, puddings The kids consider hot air popcorn a big treat.  We try and limit the candy in the house - although we all like it!  We just made homemade rock candy with grape juice.  Although I would like her to eat more variety, nutritionally she is OK. 

I am pretty much used to the whole short order cook thing.  Life is not simple this way - but we don't get too aggravated since we are sort of foodie/health food types and have enjoyed cooking from scratch since we met.  I can recall dying Easter eggs using various things in the kitchen - and that was before we had kids - I thought it was so much fun.  I might not have the neon eggs others have from buying their Paas kits - but I like my eggs nonetheless.

Besides our goofy food situation, dinner is never quiet or without incident around here.  Usually Sophia is saying something interesting.  Last night I got the line:

Don't worry Momma, your pants are going to save you.

What does this mean?  I have no clue.  They don't always make sense, but they almost always are amusing.

As for dinner tonight?  Well, it was pretty much calm, all were eating acceptably. And then Zach let out a totally unexpected squelchy and scary scream.  Sophia then let out her own shriek and ducked under the table like a PTSD war vet thinking there was incoming and running for cover.  She sat quivering under the table for 5 minutes while I determined that Zach likely either accidentally bit his tongue, lip or finger.  Sure wish we could teach him to say "Ouch."  As Sophia calmed herself and told me she was OK, I just had to laugh aloud.  One kid's issues impacting the other kid and their issues; it was definitely like some sort of skit.  I wondered how many people have dinners like we do.  No wonder why we don't get a lot of company for dinner these days.

** Pictures from this past weekend at Critz Farms autism event.