Cook-a-book

Joshua got a new cookbook for his birthday. He calls it his "cook-a-book". (I don't know where he got the extra "a" sound. Though he does live near Boston, and a Boston accent tends to move around "a" and "r" sounds.) At any rate, he loves to help in the kitchen and tonight was his night to cook dinner with Mom. They decided to make stuffed shells together. Joshua started by "reading" his recipe and telling Mom what was in the pictures so they could get everything out that they needed. While the shells were boiling, they got everything ready to stuff them. Joshua got the tomato sauce base ready after mixing the cheese stuffing with Mom. Since the shells were hot and we were in a hurry, Mom stuffed most of the shells while Joshua put them in the pan. Then he added the rest of the tomato sauce and the cheese. In the picture below, the shells are ready to bake. The stuffed shells turned out really well and everyone ate them. (Grace came home from dance class and had six of them. After which, she complimented the little chef.)

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While Joshua and Mary were cooking, I asked Joshua if he was the chef or the sous-chef. I don't think he has ever heard those terms before and I just wanted to see what he was going to say.

Joshua looked at me and said, "I am the sous-chef. Mom is the king chef."

And there you have it.

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I took this picture of Rebecca eating dinner tonight. You may not be able to tell, but she has stuffed about 10 small pieces of apple into her mouth. Her cheeks our stuffed with food. We have never had a child take to "people food" like Rebecca. She is highly insulted when you offer her baby food and will only eat what everyone else is eating. This started about a month or two ago. There is no way we will go through the baby food in our cupboard at this point.