Chloe has decided that she enjoys cooking and wants to cook more.  Needless to say, I find that incredibly amusing.  Not because I think she’d be a bad cook.  Quite the contrary – we all know that when Chloe puts her mind to it, she can master anything.

It’s incredibly amusing because where in the hell did she get that idea from?  Certainly not from me.  My husband cooks a bit more than I do, but not much.  In fact, the lack of culinary know-how is one of two major weaknesses in our parenting skills – the other being that we haven’t made enough of an effort to speak French with our kids.

Chloe’s desire to cook is inversely proportionate to my lack of cooking skills.  She must subconsciously yearn for home-cooked meals (which is why she never passes up the chance to go to our dear neighbors’ house for dinner).

She’s now at the point where she’s indicated her intention to cook a real meal for us.  I can’t express how much I love this idea.  Not for the reasons you might think, however.  The predictable decent-mother reaction would be something like, “I’m so proud of Chloe.  She always wants to try new things and spread her wings.  What a kid.”  Nope.  I love this idea because if she starts cooking for us (1) I will have to cook even less than I do now, and (2) I won’t feel so guilty about not cooking.  In fact, I’ll be able to argue that my complete disinterest in the culinary arts caused Chloe to want to explore said arts.  Which makes me an even better parent than I thought.