What's for dinner in the morning?

Things are settling into a rhythm now, 11 days after Dee Dee has moved in. Michele and I have gotten our crash course in what her grandma can and can't do, and Dee Dee has figured out where we keep the potato salad.

Michele and I have been talking about how to get Dee Dee to eat more healthily. She had lost some weight before she moved into Gardenview, but then she gained a bunch due to regular eating and (near constant) snacking. I think some of her clothes may be getting tight. So add "nutritionist" to the list of Michele's jobs.

This is another area where it's tempting to treat Dee Dee like one of our little girls. But you can't really tell her not to eat something, or she's had enough. If I get to be 80 years old, dadgummit, you can't tell me not to eat 63 chicken nuggets; I'm a grown man!

At Michele's suggestion, I had bought some deli potato salad for Dee Dee. None of us care for the stuff. But once Dee Dee figured out it was in the refrigerator, it was devoured in short order. That day, she had breakfast, then second breakfast potato salad, then elevensies of potato salad, then lunch.

It's become apparent that:

1. Dee Dee often doesn't know what time of day it is, so she eats breakfast for dinner and vice versa.
2. She doesn't remember when or what she last ate.
3. She eats either out of lumberjackian hunger or boredom - I haven't yet decided.
4. She'll finish whatever you put in front of her.
   
5. There is no cookie she doesn't love.
   

Typically, we get the food for her that she requests. But now that she's figured out where we keep certain items in the fridge, she's helping herself more. That's great on one level, but it makes it harder to help her eat right.

For now, our strategy is to keep more fruit on hand that she likes, and to not buy the cheese curls she ate all the time at Gardenview. But heaven help us once she figures out how to get food out of the pantry...