Everyone knows how I tortured Jordan with the Panera Bread  Baked Potato Soup.

Last night, I just walked the plank, went totally ballistic with my dinner expolits.

I made Beef Stroganoff. In the spirit of full disclosure, I should add it was not make-it-yourself Beef Stroganoff.

Let’s not go all overboard with the dinner thing. 

It was Hamburger Helper Beef Stroganoff. Ya gotta start somewhere, right?

Robert came in and asked me what was for dinner, and when I told him, he froze and looked at me, eyes huge.

“Beef Stroganoff? We’re having that?” 

I might as well of said, “we’re having Julia Childs cook for us,” because he looked that excited. Scary, sad, pitiful, I know, I know. My poor husband has grown so accustomed to tacos and spaghetti that eating Hamburger Helper Beef Stroganoff, at the moment, seemed better to him, than, well, me wearing it.

Before he turned to walk out, around he said, “but what will the kids eat?”

Dum du dum dum dum…….

“I suppose they’ll eat Beef Stroganoff now won’t they, or they’ll be hungry,” I said. Ain’t no taco meat left tonight.

“Wow,” he said “that sounds GOOD.”

I whipped up my packaged dinner, put it on plates, set it on the table and called the kids in for dinner.

I let them sit down to eat, and then walked away, bracing myself for the plate I just knew was going to fly by my head at any second, noodles and gravy splattered on the wall in rejection.

But a funny thing happened.

It got very quiet.

I was scared to turn around so I just walked into my bedroom, and I waited.

A few minutes later, I peeked out into the still silent dining room. This was almost as fun as Christmas day.

There was no trash can near the table.

No napkins surrounding the plates to catch anything that might come back up.

No pleas for hot dogs or tacos.

Nope, there were just kids there, quietly eating away.

I tip toed over to the table, scared to interrupt, and finally said, “so, what do you think?”

Jordan paused briefly and said, “wow, this is great, you can make it any time.”

Lord have mercy, I nearly fainted.

 My child has been kidnapped by aliens.

Or I’ve been played like a well tuned violin for the past twelve years.

I’ll let you decide.

(P.S. Thank you to everyone who sent me notes about losing Tank. It’s been strange, quiet, but we’ll be okay.)

If you enjoyed this post, get the e-mail version, follow my Working Mom series, or become an Examiner yourself!