Sometimes I write letters to Ellen DeGeneres. No particular reason. Just because I can.

Dear Ellen, my three-year-old WILL NOT EAT MAC & CHEESE! He will NOT do it and you can’t make him. I know because I’ve tried. Many, many. many. many times!

On a side note, he loves to watch me prepare food.  So tonight I stood him on a chair so he could watch me fix mac & cheese.  “Maybe then he’ll eat it,” I said, chuckling.

Here’s the thing, Ellen, when it comes to cooking, I have a talent at burning things. I can burn absolutely anything, even peanut butter and jelly sandwiches – I’m that awesome!

So…..after the fire department finished extinguishing our stove for the 6th time this month, I ran out to the store and bought a couple microwaveable mac & cheese bowls and had my son help me stir those. The interesting thing about these mac & cheese bowls is that they were part of a limited edition Stars Wars promotion.  Each noodle was shaped like the head of one of the characters – C-3PO, Darth Vader, that creepy green guy who talks backwards – you get the point.

After the mac & cheese finished boiling over in the microwave, I showed my son the bowl and asked him if wanted some. “No! No! No!” Why did I ever think his response would be different?

As a last-ditch effort, I took one noodle out of the cup, placed it on a plate with a fork and put it in front of my son.  He looked at it, picked the fork up and ate the noodle!  He ate it! He ate, mac & cheese!  The thing is, the noodle he ate was shaped like Darth Vader’s head.

It looks like it took the power of the dark side to get my toddler to eat mac & cheese.

Sincerely,

A. Marie