Rose, Bud, Thorn

As a child, my home was run by a splendid woman who, though married when we were all born, was single for most of the time she was raising us. This situation framed much of how I viewed the world and when I grew up and got married (and thus far, I have remained married! Woo-hoo!) I had to adjust to a different set of circumstances that come when two adults are around...

Well, dinner-time is one of those circumstances that is, well, hmmmm.... how can I say this....

HUGEMONGOUSLY 

                                                                                                   different!

My mom was busy working two jobs to put food on the table (as the saying goes) but one of the side effects of this was that she wasn't around to actually put the food on the table.

The kitchen of my childhood was a fend-for-yourself place, so we ate what we were capable of conjuring up for ourselves, and time-wise it was more based on when we were hungry rather than during a pre-determined dinner hour. Most of my eating-based memories as a youth are rather calm, maybe even lonely, as I only ate if/when I felt like it and that didn't always cross paths with other inhabitants of the home.

Well, NOT ANYMORE!!!

Nowadays, mealtime is well-attended, shall we say! I can confidently use the absolute "NEVER" to describe the how often I eat alone. Our dinnertime systems have to be somewhat flexible to account for friends, neighbors, and strays who smell something yummy and want to join the party.

Overall, I am a people-person so I don't mind this change in circumstances -- in fact, I kinda like it... although, I confess, it can get a little -- okay... a LOT -- noisy.

One of our strategies to minimize dinnertime chaos is to have the Day-Child in charge of constructive conversation! (I haven't written about Day-Child duties and privileges yet?!?! Note to self for future blog post! Note to you: in short, the Day-Child is the one who gets to -- and has to -- do certain things that otherwise would get fought about if there were no such designation.)

A common thing the Day-Child has been opting for lately to run the dinnertime discussions is Rose, Bud, Thorn. This is when each person gets a chance to tell something wonderful that happened that day (the Rose), something they're looking forward to tomorrow (the Bud) and something they're struggling with (the Thorn).

My baby girl who just turned two has even caught on to this, and it was with such great joy today that she was jumping (a new skill) and was saying: "And my Rose is that I can JUMP! And my Bud is that I gonna JUMP tomorrow! And I don't have a Thorn cuz I can JUMP!"
Ahhh, the joys of jumping. I guess I should try it sometime!