I Will Not Eat those, Sam I Am, I Do Not Like Green Eggs and Ham!

SPLAT!!! An egg falls to the floor. Ughhh, I hope this isn’t an indication as to where my day is headed. I look over at Bella, she’s got that mischievous look in her eyes, they’re gleaming really. “Bella, don’t you dare go over there and get into that egg, stay here Love.” She makes a move, I run for it and barely beat her to the punch. With the 409 in hand, I quickly wipe up all that I could of the dismantled egg shell and goopy mess and immediately my toddler decides to inspect the area for any gooey missed parts she could get herself into. I heat my pans, set up all of my supplies and try, and I really mean try, to put a breakfast together. After all, we’re both getting sick of Kicks and Cheerios for breakfast each morning while Dad isn’t here to cook.

By this point, I’ve got my eggs beaten for my French toast, and a batch of scrambled eggs ready to hit the frying pan. I throw the butter in, and it bubbles, sizzles, and throws up a horrendous amount of smoke. I grumble to myself, “Too hot”. I wipe up the burnt butter and let it cool down a bit. Bella is hanging onto my legs, rather pushing at them. She wiggles herself against the counter, pushing her butt up against me, trying to pry me away. “Bella, I’m trying to make breakfast…” I say and she cries. She probably already knows where this is heading. Again I make an attempt at the butter, and again it sizzles, but it doesn’t burn this time. I turn around just in the knick of time and catch my angelic daughter holding the bowl of uncooked scrambled eggs by the very edge, most of the contents already on the floor.

“Bella!” she looks up at me, unsure of whether or not I’m going to be mad. She decides she’s safe and turns the rest of the bowl over and gives it a shake to ensure every bit of slimy mess hits my counters, floors and rug. “Ugh, Bella! Bad! That was very bad!” I spew out, maybe a little louder than I should, now she‘s crying. I hurry, pick up the egg covered rug and pitch it outside for the rain to wash off and I spend the next 10 minutes trying to get the egg off of the floor. It’s at that instant, I see the smoke rumbling from the stove, the butter is surely burnt now. It bellows out and hits even the fire alarm in the hallway on the other side of the house. The alarms go off, and Bella giggles. “Hi!” she says, waving, thinking it’s either a car honking going by or the telephone going off. She’s thinking this is pretty awesome. I just lean against the counter, towel in hand and laugh as breakfast has once again defeated me.

The end result? Well, Bella sat waiting as patiently as a 18 month old can in her highchair, practicing drinking her orange juice out of her cup while I made my second attempt at breakfast. Nearly a dozen eggs later and a stick of butter, we end up with a half decent meal. She gobbled down the French toast, happy, no doubt, she finally gets something other than cold cereal. But most surprisingly, I ended up with a not-so-bad batch of scrambled eggs, which never happens. I can’t say that Bella didn’t even touch them, because she at least picked them up with the tips of her fingers and gave them to me off of her plate as her own little promise that not even after all of that, was she going to eat her eggs. My kitchen’s a mess, and there’s syrup and eggs all over the place, but Bella gets to enjoy a bath now. And for the moment, I am currently vowing to leave breakfast for the Husband for when he’s home, at least until I’ve built up my culinary skills a bit. For now, we’ll stick with cold cereal and fruit.