Little Ways I Fail # 5,695
March 24, 2010
This morning Miles wanted oatmeal for breakfast, instant oatmeal. He got out his little packets of apple cinnamon goodness and poured them into his bowl. I put the water on the stove to boil.
He sat patiently at the table.
I walked away.
A half an hour passed. During which time I drank coffee, checked email, stared into space, willed myself to stay awake… you know the usual.
Miles walked by me into the family room. “Well, I guess dry oatmeal is good, too.”
“Oh, I’m sorry. I forgot about the water. Do you want me to make it for you now?”
“No. I was too hungry and I ALREADY ATE IT.” Cold. Dry. Uncooked.
On the bright side, at least I know he will have plenty of fodder for his therapist one day.
*****
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Does he start to school this fall?
March 24th, 2010 at 9:15 amOMG! I totally get distracted like that too. Luckily my kids know enough to nag me. Actually, as they get older, it starts to sound like, “Mom, get off your butt and get me the oatmeal already!”
March 24th, 2010 at 9:24 amHahahaha. Thanks for that! I needed a laugh and also to know I’m not the only one with a child like that. Absolutely priceless!!
March 24th, 2010 at 9:45 amToo funny! Maybe it tasted like granola?
March 24th, 2010 at 9:54 amMine have learned to tell me when the water is boiling. Now if I could just get them to actually cook I would be all set.
March 24th, 2010 at 9:56 ambahahah…that is too funny.
March 24th, 2010 at 10:00 amI do that with water I put on for pasta. And then my son will come and find me and ask if the noodles are ready - and that’s when I realize I’ve humidified my kitchen and there’s barely enough water for anything, and we start all over again! Usually he goes and finds a banana at that point.
Don’t think of it as failure - think of it as encouraging food independence. I thought I could hear the Hallelujah chorus the day my daughter learned how to use the toaster oven!
March 24th, 2010 at 10:08 amAt least you know he’s not a picky eater.
This just makes me laugh bc I have to make instant oatmeal in the microwave so the ding tells me it’s done. Thank God for the ding.
March 24th, 2010 at 10:13 amHe ate it dry and didn’t complain one iota? Oh what a sweet boy!
March 24th, 2010 at 10:21 amAwww - Miles is so dear! Oh, Chris ~ you don’t know the MANY ways this reader fails as a mama …but never blogs about it.
March 24th, 2010 at 10:41 amI’m pretty sure there’s more fiber that way. So good for him.
March 24th, 2010 at 10:49 amtears are rolling. when i do something like that i blame it on the kids they have stole all my stength, energy, and memory and that i why i have these forgetfull spells.
also he is a great kid mine would have been complaining so loudly that i may have remembered that they still needed something from me.
March 24th, 2010 at 10:51 amOMG, this made me cry laugh. I bet he was PISSED! I wonder why he didn’t say anything….
March 24th, 2010 at 10:59 amWhat a sweet boy to eat it and not complain. But, oh, dagger to the heart. At least you know he’ll be “regular” for the next few days.
March 24th, 2010 at 11:18 amYes. I agree with KLZ!!! LOL. “Thank God for the ding” (on the microwave)
March 24th, 2010 at 11:22 amMy son has eaten uncooked boxed macaroni/cheese, and (gag) tomato soup from the can (gag) with a spoon (gag) in big solid, cold clots (GAG!). This was because he didn’t want to wait for someone to cook it for him, though. Something’s wrong with that kid.
March 24th, 2010 at 11:23 amyou didn’t have to get up and he ate it anyway. sounds like a WIN to me!
March 24th, 2010 at 11:25 amPriceless!
March 24th, 2010 at 12:13 pmComes from being the youngest - but I’m sure he’ll grow and become a very well-adjusted human being!
That is teaching him to be decisive in his options.
March 24th, 2010 at 12:18 pmLOL! That is the way my son prefers his oatmeal packets!
March 24th, 2010 at 12:24 pmMine have learned not to ask for anything for breakfast that requires me to do more than pour a bowl of cereal or pop something in the toaster. At least when the toaster pops back up we all hear it. I’m not good in the mornings.
March 24th, 2010 at 12:52 pmThe oldest child would never have done that! (At least in my house.) Those youngest ones just learn to go with the flow. (Or lack thereof.)
March 24th, 2010 at 1:00 pmThrow the water in a mug and heat it in the microwave. It’s fast. There is a ding. And then there are reminder dings, too.
I am ashamed to admit that my 2 year olds already know which button to press on the microwave to open the door and to heat up the water for the oatmeal. I like to think of it not as failure or laziness but as preparing them for survial should I fall off the face of the earth and they have to wait for their father to feed them. 
March 24th, 2010 at 1:26 pmI laughed and laughed. And then I thought, right, this is one more reason I love my Keurig coffee maker. My kids make instant oatmeal by pushing a button. And they’ve learned to check that I haven’t left a coffee pod in the machine too. (There’s been more than one morning when they’ve had “extra energy” and strange tasting oatmeal.)
March 24th, 2010 at 1:31 pmLove it! The mommy brain strikes us all. Thanks for the laugh.
March 24th, 2010 at 2:09 pmGlad to know I’m not the only one who does stuff like this. Maybe we can start a “Mommy Failure” club!
March 24th, 2010 at 2:50 pmWhen my oldest was about three, I had just made his breakfast and made myself an egg white omelet. I stupidly decided I would cook the yolks up and add them to something later that day for the kiddo. Instead of using a good old pot on the stove to boil the yolks, I decided to boil them in the microwave.
They exploded in my face when I took them out. My three year old got to watch me yelp and run to the bathroom to take out my contacts (OMG, what if the boiling water and yolk had permanently welded the lenses to my eyeballs?) and wash the bits of yolk out of my hair. I smelled like sulfur for days.
The next morning, same kiddo asked me to scramble him some eggs. While I was doing that, I reheated my tea in the microwave. My son heard the *ding* of the microwave and padded into the kitchen. “Mom, are you cooking my eggs in the microwave?”
“Uh, no, on the stove.”
“Good. Because you really shouldn’t do that, you know.”
March 24th, 2010 at 2:56 pmOh No! What an easy going kid you have. Roo will eat the ramen noodles dry! Oh and the cereal!
March 24th, 2010 at 3:05 pmI blame all such incidents on momnesia, which can strike at any time. At the weekend when my daughter was playing I rushed off to get our camcorder to record the moment only to find it was not in its usual place. “When did you have it last?” my husband asked. Suddenly a memory flashed across my mind of it sitting on the tail gate of his truck, where I had put it for “safekeeping” after recording my daughter chasing bubbles outside the previous weekend. I had then forgotten all about it and no doubt it is now lying smashed to pieces on the roadside somewhere between home and my husband’s office, where it must have fallen off when he drove to work last Monday morning. Last night my husband found my cell phone on top of the trash cart in the garage - what was it doing there? I have no idea.
What a sweet post about a wonderfully tolerant boy!
March 24th, 2010 at 3:36 pmMy boys just got tired of waiting for me and learned to make it themselves in the microwave
March 24th, 2010 at 3:52 pmOh, that is hilarious! Wait until you are. . . ahem. . . . much older and you scare yourself spitless by walking back into the kitchen and remembering that you had had, indeed, plans for that hot oil sizzling away on the stove. And THAT, as KLZ hinted, is why there is a timer on the microwave - so I don’t burn down the house!
March 24th, 2010 at 4:25 pmI read this and laughed and laughed. Thank goodness it’s not just me. Mine know enough to come and remind me now.
March 24th, 2010 at 6:03 pmI blame pushing them all out of my vagina for my forgetfulness. I think I pushed out half of my braincells - the other half are blonde.
My 6 year old LIKE dry oatmeal - blech
March 24th, 2010 at 6:14 pmBoy 2 does that even though he is old enough to access the water and the microwave. He says it’s good. I guess it’s better than cold pizza…
March 24th, 2010 at 7:16 pmYou boil water on the stove for oatmeal? Really? That’s what the microwave was invented for!
…you did remember to turn off the stove, right?
March 24th, 2010 at 7:20 pmHis future wife will thank you for his non-fussy eating habits! Or maybe he will just become the cook!
March 24th, 2010 at 8:00 pmI figured this was going to be a boiling the pot dry post…the fact that it was an eating the oatmeal dry post is hilarious. It is so something I would do.
March 24th, 2010 at 8:12 pmThat makes me smile. Just this morning I was trying to explain to my 9-month-old grandson (who was mad at me because he didn’t like what I selected for him to eat) that when he’s all grown he should remember to tell the therapist that his grammy meant well, really she did.
Now I can rest knowing that, in the next room there will be another therapist cracking up at the story of how, “My mother only gave me dry oatmeal to eat.”
March 24th, 2010 at 8:38 pmHow about this, open the microwave to heat veggies for dinner and find the pizza you were fixing for lunch. LOL
March 24th, 2010 at 8:45 pmIt happens to all of us!
I have a confession to make: I used to eat the maple and brown sugar oatmeal straight out of the package when I was a kid.
And it was awesome.
Kind of like Fun Dip, only with oats! You might be able to skip the water from now on.
March 24th, 2010 at 9:00 pmPerhaps you didn’t fail; you just used a technique that will help you raise a child who can cope under less than ideal circumstances. Now there’s a life skill!
March 24th, 2010 at 9:12 pmI LOVE Miles. That’s the youngest in a family for ya, they learn not to complain and take care of business. Thanks for the laugh.
March 24th, 2010 at 9:26 pmHey, as I always say, protein is protein.
March 24th, 2010 at 9:35 pmhehe cute! poor little chicken
it could have been far worse! I was thinking he was going to attempt to pour the boiling water himself…
March 24th, 2010 at 10:02 pmYou’re not pregnant, are you? That’s SO something I would have done while I was pregnant.
Chris says: HELL NO.
March 24th, 2010 at 10:19 pmSmile, mama
You’re wonderful.
March 24th, 2010 at 11:00 pmChris… I stopped reading you for a few years, and then started again recently. I wanted to tell you for a while now that I’m seeing signs of depession in you since I’ve come back. As a depression battler myself, I guess it takes one to know one? I could be wrong. I just hope you’re ok. I know what a black hole it is, and I want you to know that I care. Then again, maybe I’m way off. I don’t presume to know your struggles or lack thereof.
Chris says: I appreciate your concern, but honestly I am not depressed.
March 24th, 2010 at 11:24 pmI can’t believe that he could get it down it is so dry. UGH!
March 25th, 2010 at 1:13 amAt my house we called that a Mommy Dearest moment. As in: Oops, that will go in your Mommy Dearest book.
Funny thing is that all these years later the things I cringe just thinking about and was SURE would be in her book she doesn’t even remember. Then there are times she will recall something that really traumatized her that I don’t have any memory of at all. It is really strange how our brains process stuff. But one thing I do know, most mothers are way too hard on themselves.
When my daughter calls me wailing that she’s had a M.D. moment with her own kids I give her this advice: Apologize and then love ‘em to bits. Love really does cover a multitude of sins. .
March 25th, 2010 at 2:25 amWhat a great post!! Even when you’re writing something “negative” I find myself smiling and laughing. You rock!!
March 25th, 2010 at 2:34 amYou’re so funny and you always make me feel like a normal mom.
March 25th, 2010 at 5:58 amHee, Chris, don’t you EVER want to get a microwave and join the dark side with the rest of us? Mwahahahaaa!
March 25th, 2010 at 6:43 amMiles knows how to survive as the youngest in a large family. He’ll tell his kids someday how his mother made him eat dry oatmeal when they complain to him about how hard they have it.
March 25th, 2010 at 9:28 ambeen there, done that…you should have seen the boiled eggs that exploded onto the ceiling one time I forgot about em!!
March 25th, 2010 at 9:49 amYou still boil water on the stove? Why not use the microwave? or the Keurig machine …
And Ironic Mom has it right - he solved his own problem - GO MILES!!!!!
March 25th, 2010 at 10:05 amSo did the pan boil dry? Cuz that’s what I would do.
March 25th, 2010 at 11:21 amThat’s the way my son always wants his oatmeal. No milk in any cereal, and he wants no water in his oatmeal - makes me cringe to see him eat it, but I have bigger hills to climb.
March 25th, 2010 at 12:21 pmYou must teach me this trick of children suffering silently. Mine would have asked for water over and over and over until I either gave in or my head exploded.
March 25th, 2010 at 1:44 pmMan, you ought to be ashamed. At least I fed my son his HCFC laden, GMO grain filled, Fake-Cheeze containing pizza piping hot.
Am shining example of perfect motherhood!
March 25th, 2010 at 1:55 pmLOL! At least he sounds grateful. People need to learn how to appreciate food for what it is, be it dried oatmeal or otherwise!
March 25th, 2010 at 2:08 pmThat is SO funny! I do things like that all the time and you’ve made me feel like I am not alone!
March 25th, 2010 at 10:07 pmI love this. It made me smile.
March 26th, 2010 at 1:31 amThanks for the good laugh.
My son has learned to make himself breakfast when I have days like these. Yogurt, milk, cereal, crackers, juice, bread, fruit, almonds… he eats it all at once. Gotta love the kiddos!
Hell, no?
What, an even eight doesn’t appeal to you?
March 26th, 2010 at 5:39 amNot that I blame you. The thought of an even four makes me want to go to bed for a week.
March 26th, 2010 at 5:41 amI think I remember you saying once that you did not own a microwave? Is that still the case or have you broken down and started using one? Just curious.
March 26th, 2010 at 1:27 pmWait! What about the water on the stove? Did you forget to turn in on? Did it boil away? Did Miles turn the stove off for you? Do you have a special stove that can tell when the homeowner has forgotten,and shuts itself off like a curling iron?
March 26th, 2010 at 5:43 pmIm so glad to know Im not the only one that does this… LOL… Seriously Im craking up at work after reading this. I can’t believe he ate it dry…
March 29th, 2010 at 12:52 pm