Lessons Learned Through Graham Crackers

Today I managed to turn a graham cracker into a lesson on how to not be selfish and how to accept people and things with disabilities.

I know. It's a stretch. I was trying to get myself out of trouble.

On days like these I'm proud of myself but then again one day they'll catch on and think mommy's a big giant buzzkill for turning graham crackers into life lessons. They'll also catch on to things like the fact that I was so busy this morning I dressed them up in their bathing suits and completely forgot to pack dry clothes and made them drove home wrapped up in towels.

Bad mommy.

Nevermind with that.

Anyway.

Today I was rifling in my bag while driving home from the spray park for the graham crackers everyone was whining about and when I pulled the first two out, they broke in half.

*shudder*

I knew this was going to be a problem so I gave two halves to each kid, completely prepared for the wrath about to ensue for my failure to deliver one big whole graham cracker to each of them and instead a "broken" one. Kid #1 happily chomped away. (Surprise!) Kid #2 started crying. (No surprise).

Mommy it's broken! I don't want a broken one! I want a nother big cacker!

Too bad.

Er.

What I mean is: (calmly) "We can eat what we've been given or we can have no graham crackers."

I know. I'm mean. But for some reason in this case, I felt the need to stand my ground on this one. The "be thankful" lesson. The "no whining until you get something" lesson. Some other lesson I can't think of right now.

Then I don't want ANY CACKERS!

"OK then, hand them to me. If you want a graham cracker next time, you can ask me nicely and apologize for not being thankful the first time."

Oh boy. I know. I'm getting carried away here.

Few minutes goes by.

Mommy?

Can I peese have a cacker?

Sowwy.

Hallelujah! Message receieved! Job done. (Surprised. Totally surprised. I'm awesome.)

A few miles down the road, kid #1 asked me for another graham cracker and as I was pulling out the graham cracker while driving, it brushed up against the plastic and shaved the corner off. Egad, what is wrong with me?!

It was a big huge cracker, but the corner shaved off. I handed it to him anyway secretly flinching.

Maybe he won't notice.

Yeah right.

My cracker's broken!

Doh!

Um. Think. Think. Think!

Yes, but it's still a cracker, right? I mean, if you see a person missing a foot, he's not less of a person right? He's still a person, right? So a cracker missing a corner is still a cracker right?

Silence.
"Right," he says. (chomp.) Smile.

Ohmigod I'm a genius.

He even looked SATISFIED AND HAPPY AS A HUMAN BEING!

OK so yes, really, it started out as me trying to get myself out of trouble, (why can't I deliver the big cracker properly!?) but I think we all learned a valuable lesson from the graham cracker today, what do you think?

Kid # 1: a graham cracker (person) is still a graham cracker (person), even if it's broken a little.

Kid #2: be thankful for whatcha got...two halves equal a whole, or look! You have two crackers instead of one!

And me: figure out how to freakin open a box of graham crackers. And if you can't, make some stuff up that sounds really good and happens to simultaneously teach a life lesson. (When do they figure out us moms are sometimes full of crap? I hope never.)

The end.