Grandma Crackers

The other day, String Bean was fussing for a snack. By fussing, I mean she wanted something, but everything I offered her was all wrong, for reasons that made no sense to me. After a frustrating round of “what about this, what about that?” she climbed up on the counter and dug through the cupboards herself. Somewhere way in the back, she found a box of graham crackers. When she was about 18 months old, she used to call them “grandma crackers,” because it was her grandma who introduced her to them, and the word “graham” held no meaning. Just a cute anecdote.

Anyway, I thought graham crackers sounded fine, especially if she had them with milk. I mean, that’s practically a healthy snack, right? She thought I was crazy when I poured her a cup of milk and told her to try dunking the crackers into it. She kept giving me her skeptical look (one eyebrow raised, the same look I give when I’m not buying into something) until I told her that used to be one of my favorite snacks at her age, and grandma’s, too. For whatever reason, ideas that come from grandma are infinitely superior to ideas that come from mom, so she gave it a try. She went through three glasses of milk, a big stack of graham crackers, and kept grinning and laughing every time at how silly it was to dunk her food into her drink, and have it be okay. Not just that it tasted good, but that mom condoned it. Sure, she ruined her dinner on it, but the cuteness of the whole activity was worth it.