Stealth ninja.

Since becoming a mother, I’ve become quite ninja-like in my day-to-day tasks.  While holding my child, I can walk through a room full of toy clutter, carefully dodging every random Lego and Fisher-Price “drive you crazy because it talks incessantly” toy with the most ninja-like stealth.  I can sneak into my sleeping child’s room to put away toys and/or clothes and not make a single peep.  I’ve learned to hone in on my ninja skills because falling with a baby in your arms or waking a sleeping baby is never fun.  I’ve learned this the hard way on both counts.  Trust me. 


Any of you who have been following my blog for a while know that I have a picky eater.  I guess karma a la king has caught up with me since I was the world
‘s worst eater while I was pregnant.  Chili cheese fries?  I ate ‘em.  Sour cream and cheddar Ruffles?  Heck yes, daily.  Fruits and veggies?  What are those?  So, my child, being primarily composed of Sonic Tater Tots and Wendy’s french fries, had no other option than to be a junk-food junkie.  I tried to help her get over this addiction by filling her up with veggies and fruits in the earlier months of her life (once she started eating solids), but now she’s completely regressed into her pre-birth junk addiction. 

One thing I have noticed, however, is that she will try to eat whatever I’m eating.  She just takes it upon herself to reach onto my plate with her grubby little hands and take whatever she wants – like I’m some community chest of food or something.  Now that she’s grown a couple of inches, she’s even tall enough to reach onto my plate when I have it on my office desk.  She can’t even see what she’s grabbing, but she doesn’t care.  It’s a grab bag of food. 

I italicized the word try because if she doesn’t like it, she’ll throw it on the ground, spit it out or play with it until it dissolves into a pile of mush on the carpet.  Half of my food winds up on the vast wasteland of carpet in our house.  If she would actually eat healthy food off of my plate, this would be a great solution to get her to eat more balanced foods.  She’s too smart for that, I’m afraid. 

Sometimes mama just wants to eat her own food.  Sometimes mama just wants to eat food without having dirty baby hands all up in it.  So, to accomplish this feat, I’ve started relying on ninja moves and ninja stealth to trick my child into thinking I’m food-free.  While Anna is watching Yo Gabba Gabba, I gracefully hide my plate of food behind my back and dart across the living room like a prima ballerina.  Most of the time she doesn’t even notice me, but if she does, my arm is securely tucked behind my back with a plate of food, and she’s none the wiser. 
Sometimes I’ll stop and dance a little bit to the Yo Gabba Gabba tunes just to throw her off of the food scent.  If she sees me dancing, she won’t think I’m holding food behind my back.  She just dances with me and then tunes back into the show. See how easy it is to outsmart a toddler?  Write this down, folks, this is verbal gold!

Some of you may think I'm mean to hide food from my child, but it's the only way I can eat, people.  Most mothers will be able to relate, and if you can’t, you’re lucky.  Very lucky.  And you’re never going to perfect your ninja skills.  So, there.  Bah.