Saturday, June 14, 2008

If You Eat This, You Can Have That...


In my ongoing quest to ease my children out of their neophobic ways, I am willing to stoop to bribery -- in the most absurd of situations, anyway.

After my pear post, I took the last pear in the house to my nine-year-old son's soccer game and out of desperation tried to push it on my 4-year-old. She was "STARRRRRVVINGGGG!" on the side lines of the game (with the container of crackers we'd packed for her sitting serenely on the kitchen counter at home).

She refused the pear, which is just ridiculous. A juicy cold pear on a hot day? Annoying!

So... instead of getting into an epic battle (which, if you knew my four-year-old, is no small undertaking), I took the shortest and easiest route: I bribed her.

Pointing to the Italian ice cart that was being pushed around the perimeter of the steamy hot soccer field (and which was an inevitability for us, given the heat and the fact that it was the last game of the season, and the fact that every other kid appeared to be slurping melted fluorescent ice out of paper cups), I told her she could have an ice if she ate half the pear.

Bribery's not really the ideal situation, but there was this simple fact: I was willing to buy her an ice, but not-no-way-no-how with an uneaten pear sitting in my bag. And, it worked. She ate the pear, and loved it -- and was so excited about her new discovery that shopping at the Coop later, she jumped up and down, chanting "Pear! Pear! Pear!" in the produce aisle.

This would have been impossible just 6 months ago, even with the bribery. Anyone else out there bribing their kids?

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

really you should just think of it as an incentive, you won't feel quite so bad...grown-ups get incentives - why shouldn't kids?

Nicole said...

I bribe myself and my 3.5-yr-old son every day. If I eat all my salad or veggies, I get dessert. Same thing w/ him. He'll eat broccoli, salad, just about anything, as long as he gets dessert, which can be something as simple as three chocolate-covered almonds, a small bowl of vanilla ice cream, rice pudding, etc.