A funny thing happened at dinner the other week.

A bit of back story first:

Both of my kids are bread fiends.  They come by this honestly; there are few things in life quite as delightful as warm, soft rolls with butter.  Mmmmmm…(subtly wipe drool off chin.)  BUT, it’s not like we have bread every night.  It’s pretty rare for me to 1) plan it with the meal, 2) remember it at the store, and 3) coordinate bake time so the rolls are actually finished about the same time as the rest of our food.

A few weeks ago we were sitting down for a family dinner together on a weeknight.  This in itself is a bit of a miracle — between T-man’s tae kwon do classes, my occasional meetings, BrightSide’s softball games, and necessary yard work (yay, spring!) it can be hard to gather all four of us around the table.  I’ve been known to stand in the meat section at the grocery store, phone out, scrolling through the calendar to plan dinners.

I’m pretty sure my mom didn’t have to overcome scheduling conflicts for a simple evening meal.

Anyway, we managed to converge around the table one night for a crock pot meal (usually a hit, except with Bear who’s on some kind of hunger strike right now when it comes to decent food), and it just so happened that dinner included a couple of veggies and buttery heat-and-serve rolls.

(BrightSide loves these rolls.  He says they remind him of lunch at his grandmother’s house because they were always on her table.  He does some weird — sorry, UNUSUAL southern thing with them that I’d never seen before we got married.  He saves his for dessert, tears them into pieces, and then covers them in dark Karo syrup.  All three of us stare at him like he’s grown a second head when he does this, but it sure does make him happy.)

So we’re set for good food, family time, and (hopefully) some kind of meaningful conversation.  We’re enjoying all three and, since BrightSide and I are both trying to be responsible (UGH) about what we’re eating, we limited ourselves to two rolls each.  (I know that doesn’t sound like limiting but, in my defense, they’re really small rolls.)

Enter basic level math:  There are twelve rolls to a package.  Two adults eat four rolls in all, leaving eight rolls in the basket or four per kid.  And the kids are old enough to do these computations.

My little bread monsters are in carb heaven.

Bread on the table is an all-consuming distraction in our house, so the kids are only doing a semi-decent job of eating a balanced dinner.   T-man was mostly focused on squishing the center of the rolls outward to form a well that he could fill with honey.  Bear was happily gulping them down in two large bites.  And I was preoccupied with the fact that, despite the food available to them, they were basically eating starch for dinner.

BrightSide was at the kitchen counter when the two of them finished scarfing down their third rolls and asked me for the two that were left.  I quickly calculated the amount of “real” food they’d eaten and said three was enough, they could have the others in the morning.

I’m honestly not sure what happened next.  All I know is I was sitting at the table, finishing my meal, and the kids began cheering because BrightSide had said they could eat the last rolls.  (I believe his exact words were something like, “Oh, what the heck.  Knock yourselves out.”)

IMG_8129

I looked at them, and looked at him, and I remember thinking oh, whatever.  I’m just too tired to choose this fight. 

So, in summary…they asked for the mouthwatering rolls, I said no, he said yes, and rejoicing ensued.

Wait, what?  Is that how it works?!

All these years I’ve been asking a question and accepting the answer, when I should have simply kept asking successive people until I got the answer I really wanted.

Damn, those kids are smart.