The little epicure

I've done this parenting thing before, right? Because for the past month I've been growing more and more frustrated over the Pooter's eating habits. Because for several months, she was a greedy gobbler, nursing every 4 hours and eating 3 meals a day, at least a jar of baby food at a time. Then, suddenly, she wanted nothing to do with food. Then, she learned to shake her head no. No! It's too soon for defiance. But, except for the nursing and an occasional spoonful, whe wouldn't eat. I blamed the teething. Then she got shots. Then she got a cold. Then she was teething again. Finally, we ran out of excuses. She'd just shake her head "no" and I'd have to try and sneak food in. Then 2 things happened.

First, I sat her in her chair and, to keep her occupied, I gave her a couple of mini wheats. Just to play with, because she really hasn't been into the whole "put things in the mouth" routine. At all. Even my mother commented on it. Give her Cheerios and she just plays with them and sticks them in her diaper. Anyway. I turn away for a sec and when I turn back, she's eaten half a mini wheat. So a light bulb goes off. I start serving her stuff on stuff, like hummous on toast or baby food spread on a cracker. That sort of thing. I find out she likes to eat off of something, but she's still slow on the bringing things to her mouth. Then, whenever I try to get a spoon to her mouth, she grabs the spoon, so I start giving her a spoon to keep her busy while I shovel in with my spoon. This works for a bit. Finally, duh, I give her the spoon with the food and she puts the food in her own mouth. Follow me here. She completely bypassed bringing food to her mouth by hand and went right to using a spoon. I thought it was a fluke, but Gar gave her the spoon at the next meal and let her dip into the bowl and she did it like 4 times in a row.

The other thing she bypassed was the so-called "stage 2" baby foods. She likes the fruits and veggies. But the spaghetti and cheese or garden veg dinner, no way. The other night we were eating in the living room and G puts down his bowl of penne with homemade vodka sauce and Poot scoots right over and puts her whole face in the bowl and comes with vodka sauce all over her face. So, basically, forget the baby food spaghetti, she wants penne with vodka sauce(settle down, the vodka boils off).

So now I've just been feeding her mostly what I eat with a little baby food thrown in. Likes: blueberry apricots smoothies, hummous, baba ghanoush and kiwis. Dislikes: tomatos.

Enough blather. Let's see some baby pictures.