Day 1-Success! Kind of

For the first meal of my challenge, I picked a meal that would be high up on the "kid friendly" meter-Grilled Cheese and Tomato Soup. Well, high on most kids meter. I also went with a few parenting tips I have heard from several friends on how they get their kids to eat. Tip #1: Little bellies can get overwhelmed and turned off by big portions. I think this one comes from Supernanny herself. Tip #2: Make food fun and Tip #3: Starve them till supper!

The recipe comes from the Queen of all things domestic, Martha (who needs no last name). I am not normally a tomato soup fan, but for some reason I took a liking to this recipe. Plus, it gave me the idea for the "fun food". Martha made a spider web design with sour cream and half and half, so I told Jackson we were having Spider Soup for dinner. I bought little plastic spiders and hung them off the bowl. I left him in suspense all day if there would be real spiders in the soup:) Come to think of it, that could be why he freaked out a little about the black specks in the soup (pepper). I made the grilled cheese into bats using a cookie cutter and we had our first Halloween meal of the season. The cookie cutter made the grilled cheese just the right size for a 5 and a 3 year olds belly and I spooned only half a cup of soup into their bowls. The real trick, I think was the starving part. They had both asked about dinner twice leading up to the meal, so I knew I had a chance!

Jackson actually dove right in and I was doing cartwheels in the kitchen! I couldn't believe it-could it really be this easy! Start a blog about your kid being a picky eater and Poof! But, alas, success did not stay for coffee as Jackson quickly decided he was no longer hungry after 3 tiny sips. The meal continued with several "Jackson, EAT!"'s and ended in negotiations of 4 more bites or no dessert. Final Tally- 1/4 of a 1/2 cup of soup and no grilled cheese. Success? Failure? I am taking my W and calling it a day!

Here is the link to Martha's recipe. Pot Roast tomorrow:)

http://www.marthastewart.com/recipe/creamy-tomato-soup