the dinner dilemma.

As a parent, there are so many memories you want to preserve. I spend so much of my time taking pictures of Bennet and writing down memories. I don't want to forget a single second.

Most memories are good ones - cute faces your baby makes, funny things they say or do, activities the two of you like to do together. Lately, Bennet has been imprinting a new memory on my mind. Unfortunately, it's one that's quite stressful and that makes me very sad.

I don't know if it's just a phase he's going through. Maybe it's because his molars are coming in and he's dealing with quite a bit of teething pain. It's possible that he just loves his "Ma Ma Ma" a whole lot. Who knows.

Every night, when I start to cook dinner, I put "Barney" or "Yo Gabba Gabba" on TV, bring out his box of toys, and hope that he plays quietly in the living room. In the past, that has worked well. It's definitely not working anymore.

Throughout my dinner-cooking activities, Bennet now can be found doing one of the following two things:

1 - Holding on to my legs and crying - which makes maneuvering through the kitchen difficult!


2 - Sitting on the floor with his toys, pots and pans, or whatever I am trying to distract him with and sobbing and saying, "Ma Ma Ma."


It's pretty stressful. When Andrew walked in the door from work today I was incredibly frazzled and Bennet's hair was soaked with sweat and tears. Thankfully, our chicken pot pie somehow had made it to the oven, and we had a nice, evening walk around the neighborhood and then had a yummy dinner. He hates me being in the kitchen. It's heartbreaking. What's a mom to do?

Although it's stressful and it completely breaks my heart, it's a memory I'm glad I snapped some photos and videos of today. It makes me smile to think about when he's a teenager and I show him videos and pictures of the dinnertime shenanigans he used to cause in our house!