Putting my cheese steak where my mouth is

Not too long after Chris got here, he mentioned that he'd really like to make us all cheese steaks. Meat, veggies, cheese...what's not to like? I was absolutely in favor. I do appreciate when a man likes to cook. My grandfather, my dad, my brother...all excellent cooks. And even though I rarely eat them anymore, cheese steaks are way on up there as one of my favorite indulgences.

Monday night he's cooking and the kids are complaining they are hungry. Then Sara falls asleep. After failing to wake her up, I give up and the rest of us sit down to dinner. Tucker gets pissy and doesn't want to eat the cheese steak.

I am unfailingly amused. It's a cheese steak, not a puppy dog. After trying and failing to convince Tucker that he actually likes all the ingredients in a cheese steak, I give it a break and decide to eat mine.

It was sooooo gooooooooooooood.

As I'm finishing up, Tucker starts making noise about how he wants something different to eat.

Fine, I tell him. Try the cheese steak and if you don't like it, then you can have a bowl of cheerios. I've had this 'discussion' with Tucker before and what he wants is to go out to eat. Probably so he can eat a cheeseburger which is what? Meat, cheese, and bread.  Which I will point out again, is just another form of what's already on his plate. But Chris was nice enough to make us dinner and since it includes food I know Tucker already actually likes, Tucker needs to just suck it up and try it. And stop being so bratty in the process.

And may I just say, poor Chris, man. He got stuck in the middle of a pile of parent/child yuck.

Then. THEN. Tucker looks at me and mutters, "I just want to throw this at you."

Say what?!?!

I'm already annoyed with his behavior and embarrassed that someone went to the trouble to actually cook for us and one child won't wake up to eat and the other is being super obnoxious.

So then I make a big mistake. BIG mistake. HUGE.

I say - more as a challenge then as permission - 'You want to throw that at me? Go. Ahead."

And yep, he does it. Hits me in the middle of the face and the cheese steak slides down my face and plops onto the table.

I stand up and drag him upstairs kicking and screaming.

Now, I'm in a horrible position as a parent. Tucker KNOWS better. But I did tell him, albeit sarcastically, that he could do it.

Sucks to be me right now.

Tucker is upstairs with me crying because he is well aware that he's in big trouble. To my great surprise, I didn't raise my voice, nor did I physically touch him other than to drag him up the stairs.

What I DID do is kneel down, make him look at me in the eye - well, after I washed the cheese steak off - and told him I was desperately disappointed in his behavior. His behavior was embarrassing to me and I know he knew better than to do what he did. Then I wouldn't let him hug me and I wouldn't hug him.It surprised me how devastating that was to him. I was still pretty angry. And he lost his 3DS, Wii, and all fun for a week. Some things for more than that. Some things he STILL hasn't earned back. He apologized to Chris and he tried the cheese steak. Which he then ate over half of.

Sigh.