Expanding Diet/Finger Foods – UPDATE

[Anonymous]

Update – so after saying that Marisa prefers solids lately, she’s
starting to fight those too. She’ll only eat like 1/3 of breakfast
before pushing spoon away – does better with her dinner meal. Still
seems mainly like teeth and also like she wants to feed herself. The
only finger foods we’ve done are veggie puffs – which she is starting
to get hang of. Is it OK to try frozen blueberries and frozen peas (two
foods she’s had pureed and likes) – maybe offering purees and cereal
first and then the finger foods once she seems done?
knb182006-5-5 9:18:40

[Anonymous]

Hi Karen –

It sounds like she is a lot like Owen – I can’t remember exactly but I know that by the time he was 9-10 months we could no longer spoon feed him. He just wanted to do it himself and would push the spoon away if we tried. We got a lot of flack from my in-laws who thought he was too young for finger foods and would always try to spoon feed him anyway even though he would totally refuse. I’m sure that at Thanksgiving Owen was less than 11 months old and he was 100% not spoon fed anymore.

Anyway, we had to come up with a lot of alternatives and we did just what you are thinking – gave him finger food versions of foods he had eaten and liked. We did lots of peas, blueberries, VERY ripe banana, cheerios, very smalled chopped green beans, small pieces of pasta, small bites of sweet potato fries – that kind of stuff. It was hard and I felt like he was eating the same thing every day but he liked it and ate a lot so I just had to stop worrying about it. If she will pick it up and eat it, it’s worth a shot – and will make meals much less frustrating for both of you guys!

[Anonymous]

Laura – yea – Owen and Marisa sound a lot alike. I think I’ve read some
of your other posts – and Owen is very active too, right? So is M –
totally a mover and a shaker!

She hates banana (literally shudders at a taste) but will definitely
start trying peas and blueberries and sweet potato pieces. Would I just
bake some sweet potato and cut it up for her? And with pasta – just
cook regular adult pasta to make it very soft?

I’ll probably keep trying with the spoon and see if I can get in some
before she pushes it away (only because I can sneak in extra formula
with the cereal that way) and then offer finger foods after? She’s only
just getting the hang of the puffs now so it may take some time but
could be fun too!

[Anonymous]

Active doesn’t even describe Owen – he’s nuts!! The boy never stays still. Even when I was only 10 weeks pregnant and had an ultrasound my mom gave him the nickname “squirmy” because he was moving so much. At every OB appointment the doctor or midwife would comment “You’ve got an active one” or something like that. We were a little nervous about what we were getting into and he hasn’t stopped since! I think it’s fun though – he’s so good natured, just always wants to run around and check stuff out.

Anyway, yes, that’s exactly what we did too. We would give him as much by spoon as we could and then would end the meal with finger foods. And yes, cooked regular adult pasta very soft (I think we bought organic) and smaller pieces were better than spaghetti, like rotini and elbows because it was easier for him to pick up. We’d cut them small and sometimes put olive oil on it, but I don’t think we did that until later. Same with the sweet potatos – we’d cook them well then cut into small pieces. We’d add cinnamon to them too sometimes, once we knew he could handle that.

[Anonymous]

Oh my god – everyone totally used to laugh at me when pregnant because
she went nuts in the womb. My belly looked like tidal waves at times.
At all the ultrasounds the technicians would have a hard time since she
wouldn’t stay still. I had an emergency appendectomy at 16 weeks at DH
and I always joke around that it was because she probably kicked the
appendix one too many times. I think it’s fun too. Tiring and sometimes
hard to go out, etc – but definitely fun. We went out for pizza last
night and were able to keep her occupied in her stroller (restaurant
didn’t have high chairs) only because other kids were sitting near us
(she’s VERY social) so she spent a while squealing at them and every
dog that went by (we were outside) and chewing on a spoon LOL.

Thanks again – we are excited to start trying! Tonight is her last
night of broccoli/cauliflower (Gerber tender harvest makes a blend) so
we’ll see how much of that/cereal she’ll eat and then put down some
frozen peas for her.

Tomorrow we are starting a chicken trial but after that I think we’ll try pasta.

knb182006-5-5 10:58:43

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