Getting More Involved

 The boys helped make dinner tonight.  Jack wanted to try making salad, so he picked some spinach from the garden, juiced a lemon for dressing and asked me to cut up some almonds he'd gotten out.  He ended up not really grooving on it, but I added it to the big bowl of arugula salad with lemon vinaigrette and Parmesan that Aaron and I were eating, and as it turns out the almonds were delicious.  I told Jack that I loved the combination, and he was pleased to have contributed something. 

When Matteas saw Jack juicing a lemon, he was desperate to juice something as well so Jack suggested I let him make orange juice.  Normally I get really OCD about messy kid experiments right before dinner, but I think all the sunshine today made me a little more laid back than usual so I said yes and gave Matteas a bowl.  He did his best, and I helped him squeeze the last drops of juice out of his mangled orange.  Then Jack juiced another orange and I had Matteas help me strain the pulp.  Next, we added the juice from the fruit salad I'd made the boys for lunch and topped it off with a little blood orange soda for added fizz.  The boys were so pleased with their efforts and were chatting away the whole time, Matteas' voice shaking with excitement as he hatched a brilliant plan: "Jack, you can make a salad while I make the juice, and then we can share the food and have a party!"  This was a particularly amusing plan to me because neither of the boys like salad, but I encouraged them in their communal sentiments. 

Because we were feeling fancy, we poured the juice into champagne flutes and lit candles, which I had the boys pick out at the store earlier this week.  We had a family toast, and the boys pronounced the evening the Best Dinner Ever.  I need to come up with more ways to authentically involve them in meal preparation, not just give them mushrooms and butter knives whenever they want to 'help.' 

We also planted a whole bunch of seeds before dinner, and we're going to make charts to keep track of how long it takes before they sprout.  Because everything is more official when you make a chart.