How do you get your little girl to eat dinner, when, despite containing everything she likes, she won’t give it a chance? Make mealtime funtime!

She would have nothing to do with the shrimp, carrots, broccoli, noodles or waterchestnuts in the stirfry we had for dinner. Except for the latter, these are all things she loves.

Was she being difficult for difficult’s sake? Perhaps – she is three, after all. To her credit, though, she couldn’t eat her corn on the cob fast enough (or more thoroughly) this past weekend.

After several minutes of defiance, her dinner getting cold, my wife hit upon a brilliant idea – make her guess what she was eating! She likes playing a guessing game where she reaches into a bag and tried to guess what she was holding. So why not guess the food in her bowl? What fun!

Sweetie obviously agreed, as her mood lightened instantly. She was eager to play.

She ended up doing quite well, and she looked forward to each bite.

“Is that a shrimp?”

“Yes.”

“A carrot!”

“Yes.”

“Another shrimp?” (while making a face)

“No, that’s a waterchestnut.. it’s kind of like a raw potato… we won’t give that to you again.”

And so on….

She did start peeking after that, but kept eating anyway. Peace and fun were restored to the dinner table at last!