Picky Eater

Much to my dismay (though, truthfully, not totally to my surprise), Sara has become the poster child for Picky Eaters Anonymous.  I wonder if they pay for that gig?  Even when she requests a certain meal, once it's on the plate in front of her, she instantly becomes wary.  She'll sort of examine it as she picks it up with her fork or spoon, then lets it slide back off onto the plate.  She's gotten good at making piles with her food.

Our meal times usually turn into a series of bribes.  For one bite, she can watch Dora.  For another, she can play chase with Daddy.  For a third, we'll put together the train track.  The list goes on and on.  The biggest problem is that Sara has figured out that we only have so much energy; eventually the bargaining comes to an end.  And whether she's taken her bites or not, she'll wave her hands in the air in an exaggerated sign-language gesture and yell out, "ALL DONE!"  While I'd like her to eat her meal, I'd rather let her leave the table at this point than make her stay just long enough to decide to make a mess (rereading this, I wonder if allowing her to leave is part of the problem ... painful as it may be, making her ride it out a little longer might cause some eating to occur...???). 

When we were in Florida, Sara ate at least her weight in fish nuggets, and she can put back some serious amounts of Apple Jacks, frozen pancakes, donut holes, and mac & cheese.  At the moment, though, those items pretty much sum up her very short list of preferred foods (and I realize those particular items don't make me look like Mother of the Year, either, but I withdrew my name from that pot a long time ago).  On St. Patrick's Day, I made Shepard's Pie, which is a combination of the most basic of foods: meat, potatoes, carrots, peas ... she wouldn't touch it.  The other day we ate at Matt's; Sara ate roughly five bites of rice, a few spoonfuls of guacamole, and left her quesadilla and beans totally untouched.  My parents watched her demolish that same meal with zest when they were here back in December.  On Sunday morning I made eggs, another has-been on her favorites list, apparently, because she wouldn't eat those, either.

I remember being a picky eater as a child, and I know that I probably drove my mom crazy over the number of times I asked, "We're having that for dinner?"  I went through two main eating phases during my high school years: one included bagels and water (or maybe a Cherry Coke); the other included an almost nightly request for homemade taco salads.  My palate has matured a lot since then.  The point is, I get that I wasn't the easiest kid  to please in the kitchen, and, as a result, I'm not necessarily asking for a child who is excited about the possibility of sampling fine cuisine from every corner of the world.  Just one who will quit turning her nose up at anything that remotely resembles an actual meal.  If I had her willpower, I'd sure be able to shed my last five in no time flat.

HELP!