Ice Cream for lunch?

Day Five:  Blogging for Down Syndrome Awareness in the 31 for 21 Challenge!

So the other day, Bradley went down for a much needed nap.  Sometimes we have to fight a little bit, but today it was a quiet little token argument that quickly settled into his even breathing and the occasional cute little snore.  When I heard him get up, I was in my room and he took off down the hallway past my room and into the kitchen.  As I made my way to him, this is the scene I found waiting for me: 

That is pizza in his hand, and he had to open the fridge, open the drawer to find what he wanted.  He pulled out the pizza.  What I am not sure about was if he opened the freezer door first and went for the ice cream (it's sitting on the ground in front of the freezer), or if he went for the pizza first.  Either way, in my head I see him going for ice cream, because it was easiest to find...but looking for the pizza because he really does love pizza.  Or maybe he just grabbed the pizza when he heard ME coming down hall figuring if he started with pizza first there might be more likelihood for me to give in to ice cream after.  He also doesn't say ice cream, that's more of a point and the sign is tough for him, so perhaps he wanted to make sure we were communicating as clearly as possible so that I understood how much he would like both pizza and ice cream.  Hmmm

Lucky kid, he got both, I mean, if he makes an effort with food - well, who am I to stall the wheels of progress. I need him to intake calories and if I have to keep pizza in the house to keep him eating...well, Dominos is 5.99 and I can make pizza dough...so it's just a matter of determining how picky he is going to be about his pizza and going with what works. 

Food is a fickle thing with him.  Sometimes we go out just to encourage him to eat.  Sometimes I beg for recipes so I can duplicate his favorite things at home and sometimes that works... and sometimes, he falls asleep with his head on the table before his meal gets there and all the planning and work is for a go box to try at home later or tomorrow.  Such is the way of it.  When your kid is food challenged and there are only so many things he will eat, can eat, feels safe eating...then you can get pretty creative and go quite a bit further than you would believe to get them to get the calories they need every day.

As crazy as it seems to enjoy the fact that he does the above (totally not environmentally sound I know) I have everything he might enjoy down low so that whatever he grabs is something that I would love for him to eat.  I try to keep the heavy glass stuff up, and keep the soda to a minimum because he can't have it but once in a while the girls get root beer.  He has control of the door and what he wants out of the fridge and for the most part, he'll eat what he pulls out.  When he goes to the utensil drawer, sometimes he he'll pull out one spoon, sometimes he'll pull out five or so small spoons that I send in his lunch and line them up at his place at the table, when I get him settled and open his yogurt, he'll take one bite for each spoon and be done.  Good thing he takes pretty big bites.  Lately, it's been on spoon and he's done very well eating all his yogurt, or pudding or peaches...or ice cream.  Whatever works!  He's gaining weight and he's growing taller...take that Hiatal Hernia!  And I say that in a total we can live like this symbiotically kind of way, not in the mean, snarky way I want to say it!  :-) 

Okay Bradley...what's for dinner tonight?