I've bean boozled

Now, I consider myself a pretty decent cook. Though you'd never know it. The dinner time show at our house is pretty unbelievable. I feel like I have to bribe, yell, feed, say "take a bite" or "chew" a bit too often around here. Somehow we've gotten in some rotten habits and dinner is occasionally not the wonderful quality time that it is advertised to be. Our boys ARE getting better, but still not perfect.

So the other night we went to the U of U gymnastics meet. Jacob's chosen treat was a package of Jelly Belly's. Nacho ordinary Jelly Bellys. These were "Bean Boozled" jelly bellys, meaning though they make look alike, each color has 2 flavors that are totally opposite of each other and it's the luck of the draw which one you get. For example, a blue jelly bean could be either berry blue, or toothpaste. Disgusting!! I can't even imagine eating something like that, but thanks to a current interest in Harry Potter, it pleased him to find such a thing.

Trying to enjoy the meet with three little boys, I glanced down the row at Jacob who was enjoying his jelly beans. "Oh, darn. Ear wax." "I think that one was baby wipes." Are you serious? The funny thing was that on the gross ones he didn't try to spit them out, shake convulsively or make faces like those I have seen at the dinner table. He chewed and SWALLOWED the jelly belly. No one had to give him a pep talk or pour him a glass of milk to choke it down!!

Why didn't I think of that? Next time, I'll prepare lasagna, salad and breadstick JELLY BEANS. Then perhaps we can talk about our day, the weather and how much we love each other at the dinner table instead of playing "Heads or tails", or "You take a bite, I take a bite." Love it!! Or, perhaps I could just mix up some nice pencil shavings topped with skunk spray and see how that goes over. The possibilities are endless! Thank you Jelly Belly!! (I hope they are more artificially flavored than naturally!!!)