total failure as a mother

OK, it's not that dramatic. But, tonight I failed miserably at one of the basics of motherhood: macaroni and cheese.

The Kiddos requested mac&cheese for dinner this evening, but only if I "make it like Daddy". *sigh* This is the story of my life these days. Daddy is a very particular person, he pretty much has a set way to do almost anything. Daddy used to be in charge of things like macaroni and cheese for this very reason. But now that Daddy has a job that keeps him from getting home in time for dinner, I have to try to make all kinds of things "like Daddy", and it drives me nuts, because not even Daddy should have to make things "like Daddy", that's how insane some of these things are. So... macaroni and cheese.

We are a Kraft macaroni and cheese family because Daddy has declared it to be the best macaroni and cheese there is, and he is not going to have his children eating some kind of frou frou mac and cheese like that Stouffer's (which is my fav, by the way). You might be sitting there right now thinking I must be some kind of lug nut if I can't even make Kraft macaroni and cheese. Well, yes and no. The problem that Daddy has with the Kraft is that he hates the tiny little noodles. Being the hardcore Italian that he is, he needs to eat a larger, more substantial pasta. So, when Daddy makes macaroni and cheese he uses Barilla rotinis, and he throws the Kraft noodles away. You read that right. He just tosses perfectly good pasta noodles in the trash. So, making macaroni and cheese "like Daddy" means that they don't want the wimpy noodles, either.

So, I boil the water (score one for Erika. I can boil water). Here's where it all goes awry... I mindlessly dump a whole box of Barilla fioris in the water (we didn't have any rotinis... I was hoping The Kiddos wouldn't be so cruel as to reject the fioris). The WHOLE BOX. Do you know how much pasta that is? Well, first of all, I can tell you it is too much pasta to fit in the pot that I had all the boiling water in. It barely fit. Secondly, it is far too much pasta to expect The Kiddos to eat. I realized right away that I had made a serious blunder, and now I was going to need to double the sauce to accommodate all that pasta. That's two boxes of wimpy macaroni in the trash (score one for the mac and cheese... it got me on basic pasta measuring skills).

Basically, the pasta was done and I set it to drain. I made the sauce in the pan, and then tried to add all my mountains of pasta back into the same pan to mix it in with the sauce. Why I didn't take this opportunity to switch to a larger pot, I don't know. Too logical, I guess. So, I am trying to squeeze back too much pasta into a too small pot *AND* mix it up so that the sauce is evenly disbursed. I made a huge mess, spilling pasta all over the place: the stove top, counter top, floor, evrywhere. THEN... I didn't get a spoon to serve the mac and cheese into the bowls, I just tipped the too full pot and tried to guide the right amount of mac and cheese into each bowl. This is a good system that I have used often when there is an appropriate amount of pasta in the pot... but with overloads of pasta, well, let me just say that it all kind of comes tumbling out at once.

I swear, my kitchen was such a mess. It looked like I had let The Kiddos cook their own mac and cheese (hhhmmm... that's an idea.... ) and it actually took a lot for me to get it cleaned up. So. There you have it. Total failure as a mother. How on earth could I possibly have so much trouble with macaroni and cheese?

But... they ate it. So maybe it's not *total* failure... (I do have lots of leftovers, though. Anyone hungry?)