guest post by Gwen: favourite baby snacks

Okay, so I lied, Gwen is actually not going to be guest posting. But, hey, we can pretend. A few weeks ago I sent out a plea to my Tweeps asking for their most loved out-of-highchair snacks for their babies between 10-12 months old. You see, despite the fact that this is my second rodeo, I still feel like I have no clue what I’m doing about 90% of the time. I forget so much about Evalyn’s infancy. I try to remember what she was doing/eating/saying at what stages but, basically, unless there’s a photo to look back on or a specific blog post, I don’t remember.

So a few weeks ago I found myself stumped about what to feed Gwen for (at least mostly nutritious) snacks. The thing is, she doesn’t like to be contained – having 3 meals a day confined to the high chair is bad enough as it is. Plus, we’re busy. We’re on the go. We don’t typically have time to be sitting around in the high chair more often than we already have to. So I needed to come up with some ideas of things that would be easy and relatively non-messy for her to eat on her own, out of her chair.

If you know our Gwennie, you know that she’s super picky about fruit. A kid who doesn’t like fruit! It’s absurd to me as Eva would live off fruit if she could, and has always been a fruit lover. Unless it’s in pouch form, I usually have to trick Gwen into eating fruit. As in, soft pear chunks mixed with beef stew. Delicious, right?

Sometimes she’ll be more apt to eat fruit if she’s on the go, grazing, but you know, this gets messy. Fruit is juicy and sticky and a lot of it stains. Anyway, that whole fruit tangent is a bit beside the point…

After reaching out for ideas on snacks I started racking my own brain – trying to remember what types of snacks I took with me on the go, to church, to friend’s houses, and so on, when Evalyn was a baby and what other things would be ideal for this stage. So here are a few ideas I’ve come up with that may help you if you’re looking for some new ideas.

Before I start the list, I should also note that since Gwen has been very adventerous with her food right from the start, many of the typical go to’s don’t really work. She laughs in the face of mum mums and even cheerios, which used to be thrilling and marvelous barely get the time of day anymore (unless, of course, they are in her sister’s bowl .. then they are amazing). Puffs give her a little bit of a thrill, but I don’t often shell out the money to buy them. She also is very good at self feeding and regulating her food. There are very, very few times when I have had to be concerned with her putting too much in her mouth, or taking too big of a bite or whatever. She is a pro star at pulling things out of her mouth if she can’t chew/swallow it, so that also helps with the variety I can give her.

Without further adieu, here is a list of our favourite snacks at 11 months:

- Fruit smoothies - frozen fruit, milk, banana, yogurt, spinach, probiotic, frozen veggie cubes.

- Pouches – or juicies as they are lovingly referred to in this home. We could not live without our juicies.

- Shreddies - new on our menu this week – she’s loving them – they may be too crunchy/difficult for smaller babies or babies who don’t do much self feeding.

- Peas, corn, black beans, lentils – throw a mixture of any/all of these things in a snack trap and she’s a happy girl.

- Cheese – cubes, shredded, sliced, strings … whatever. If she has cheese, all is right in her world.

- Steamed edamame beans – up until this week I had been cutting them in half but she is now able to eat them no problem as they are. Again, a snack trap full of these and she is good to go.

- Graham crackers – these were suggested by both Lynsey and Karla and so I tried them while we were making s’mores at the cottage. She likes them but doesn’t go crazy over them and I do find they’re a bit messy. So, she’s only had them a few times.

What are your favourite (older) baby snacks? Especially for when you’re out of the comforts of the high chair?

silent sunday: an apple a day

Reason #48282 why we love where we live: apple picking the backyard.

This and That…

A few random tidbits to end the week off…

Eva and I were lucky enough to spend the last few days with her Aunt Logi, my sister-in-law, while my brother is in India for business. We swam, played, walked, shopped and had an intense game of Mexican Train. What fun! Eva is definitely starting to know and remember people which I love. So much fun to see her recognizing her family members and other special people.

~

We finally got around to doing some baby proofing. I always said, Oh, I’ll do it soon. I’ll do it soon. And then, suddenly, here we are, and I should have “baby proofed” 3 months ago. But really, there’s not a lot that needed to be done. It was mostly just the kitchen cabinets. I always said I’d never lock them … I’d just teach her she can’t go in them. HA! Girlfriend was obsessed with getting into them and it was just getting ridiculous (and a little unsafe) for her to be constantly pulling things, like you know, the food processor, out. So, they are locked and this morning I waited anxiously for her to make this discovery and of course, she waited until well after morning nap to even really bother with them. And let me say, once she did figure out that she can’t get in them anymore, she was not such a happy camper. BUT once she realized she couldn’t get at them, she ended up sitting and playing with her TOYS (gasp!) for 30 minutes straight.

~

Mealtime has become somewhat horrible. Lately, when I put her in her chair with her meal, she starts devouring whatever is in front of her for about 3-5 minutes and then suddenly, it’s like a switch is flipped and she starts freaking. Not just whining and complaining. It’s more like, raging, someone is ripping my limbs off type screaming. As far as I can tell, it’s not that she doesn’t like the food, because she eats it and mmms and smacks her lips at first and it’s not that she’s full, because she sometimes calms down and just keeps eating and if she doesn’t, when she gets down and finished ScreamFest 2011, she smacks her lips and signs for food again. She rarely lets me spoon feed her – except yogurt and fruit in the morning as long as there is some pancake, toast or cracker on her tray that she can eat with her hands while I sneak the spoon in between her bites. But at lunch or dinner? Very little spoon feeding happening.

So what’s the deal? Is she bored? Does she want something different to eat? Does she just want to be a brat? Any advice?

~

We have chickens in the coop again. Evalyn loves them. She will stand outside the coop and watch them and squeal forever. And, much to my dismay, she even wants to go inside the coop with them (um, hello, gross. There’s POOP in there kid). I keep telling her she should want to go shopping and get her nails done and do girly things but I’m afraid Evan might get his way and have a little tomboy. Sidenote: The rage-filled limbs being ripped off screams often happen when we peel her away from her chickens, too.

~

I’ve officially begun thinking about first birthday stuff. How is it even possible that this is on my mind? Less than 2 months and we’ll be celebrating her first year! I’ve already made a few small first birthday party purchases and have a ton of ideas floating around in my head. Eek. Exciting.

~

Evan was in a car accident the Saturday before we left for Ottawa. No one was hurt but his truck needed to have some repairs. So, it was in the shop all week until last night. On Wednesday, my car started making a bizarre rattling noise that Evan was unsure of, so as of today, my car is in the shop. Aren’t car troubles just the best?

~

Happy Friday, friends! Love you all.

This Mom’s Best Friend

Now that Eva has started eating solids, I’ve had to learn how to organize and plan for being out and about during her “meal” times. Since she doesn’t eat a lot of baby food, this used to mean packing up little containers of chicken pieces, peas and carrots, avocado and so on … not overly convenient.

I was at WalMart a few weeks ago when I saw these.

I remember my friend Trish (same girl who makes the muffins – she’s full of great tips) having something similar for her little girl who also didn’t like to eat purees. I picked up a few and decided to give them a try.

The first time I tried it, Evalyn like it pretty well and was able to figure out how to suck the food straight from the pouch. The only problem was that I felt like she was biting down on the plastic spout and catching her teeth on it. It just didn’t seem like it was the best idea. So, I tried giving some of it to her on a spoon, which worked fine, but then, was no different than any other jar of baby food.

In talking to a few of my tweeps, someone mentioned that there are spoons that are designed specifically to attach to the Plum brand baby food pouches. Unfortunately, these brands are only sold in the states. Of course, it’s no big deal for me to travel across the border for a shopping trip, but it is physically impossible for me take a trip to Target and come home with only baby food. So, I did what any logical human being would do and put out a request on facebook to see if anyone around me had plans to go over. Lucky for me, my Aunt Shelley was going the next day.

She came back with a pile of loot.

Two of these:

And a variety of packages of Plum food.

Let me tell you – these dispensing spoons are the kind of baby product that I would normally look at, laugh, and talk about how unnecessary it is to have such strange gadgets for kids. But, I would be wrong.

These spoons – which are made specifically for Plum pouches but fit on Baby Gourmet as well – make feeding my child on the go so.much.easier.

Even though she is eating mostly table food, we aren’t yet to the point where I can assume that what we’re eating at a friend or relative’s house, or at a restaurant will be suitable for her. Since we haven’t introduced wheat or eggs, and just introduced yogurt a few days ago – eating outside of our home can be difficult. At a restaurant, if we order chicken we can share with her, but there is usually some kind of sauce or breading or something that she can’t have. And, like I said previously, while it’s possible to pack up and cart around little containers of her finger food, it’s just not the most convenient.

Now, I always have a case of spoons and a few pouches of food in my bag for when we’re out. They are easy, less messy and so much more convenient than table food or jarred baby food. And I love that there is no waste. When I feed her straight from a bowl, I always toss the remainder out. I know different people have mixed feelings about this – but my kid seems to have a perpetually snotty nose – so by the time the spoon has gone between her mouth and the bowl a few times, I’m pretty sure there’s a nice blend of snot in her dish. Which,  you know, is disgusting. I wouldn’t want to eat that. But with the pouches and spoons? No snotty backwash gets back into the pouch. I can reseal it, put it in the fridge and have her finish it off at the next sitting.

So, if you’re looking for a quick and convenient way to feed your baby on the go, you may want to give these a try.

Of course, my raving about these products is only one side of the story. The important thing is what Evalyn thinks of them.

I’ll let you be the judge.

** These opinions are completely and entirely my own – I am not affiliated with or being compensated by any of these companies in anyway.

8 Months of Joy

My Pumpkin Pie,

My oh my. You’re eight months old. You’re growing into a precious little lady right before my eyes. Just the other day, your Auntie K said you don’t look like a baby anymore and that you are looking more and more like a toddler every day. I won’t believe it. I just won’t.

My guess is that you weigh somewhere between 17-18 pounds but that’s totally just a guess. We measured you yesterday and you are now 28 inches long. You still fit well into 9 month clothes but I’ve been sneaking you into a few 12 month things on warmer days, too. You wear a size 4 disposable and have just recently moved up to the largest setting on your size medium cloth diaper covers.

Here’s how you’ve changed this month:

This has been a busy, busy month. Because you, my sweet, are a busy, busy girl. You are into e.v.e.r.y.t.h.i.n.g and I’m amazed how quickly you’ve figured what belongs to you and what doesn’t. I’m also amazed at how quickly you’ve figured out that the things that don’t belong to you are more fun. You keep me on my toes. But there’s no one I’d rather be kept on my toes by than you.

Right now your favourite things to get into are the platters on the side table in the kitchen, the door stop on Mommy and Daddy’s door, the DVDs in the coffee table, and the bar stools on the island.

You’ve made some huge progress this month. The biggest thing being that you are now a crawling machine. You did your first official crawl on April 27th, just shortly after your 7 month birthday, and haven’t stopped since. Every day you get faster and more confident – especially now that you’ve figured out that crawling not only gets you around the room you’re in, but can get you to places you can’t see at the moment. Like into the laundry room with Mommy.

You are also very keen on standing up. You like to hold my hands and stand up and have started taking steps that way. About a week and a half ago, you brought yourself to standing holding on to Nika’s back. Lots of times you pull up on things that just aren’t quite the right height to get you to a full standing position, but rather, a glorified downward dog position. You’re figuring it out though. Each day I can tell your legs are getting less and less wobbly.

Now that you are more steady, you sit up in the big bath tub to play with your toys and splash around. The only problem is that you constantly try to stand up in there, too.With that being said, many a bath time has been cut short and you’ve also become quite familiar with the word “no”.

Although you’ve been doing a waving motion for quite some time, it was about a week ago that you started to make the connection between waving, Hi, and Bye. The first time you waved for real was when you were skyping with Nana. And since then, you haven’t stopped. You wave at people all the time now. You also love to give kisses – to your friends and family, as well as to babies in books and your stuffed animals. It melts my heart to see you scoot over to your pile of stuffies and give each one of them a kiss. You prefer kisses of the open mouth variety and make a cutie pie kissing sound every time. You started the month off by blowing raspberries all the time but that habit has kind of faded away. I must admit, I’m sad about that because it was so cute to see you crawling around buzzing your lips all the time.

You are still nursing 5-6 times a day and you have made huge progress with eating solids in the last month. The list of foods you enjoy keeps growing and growing. The newest additions are mango, chicken, blueberries, grapes, prunes, barley, peaches, muffins, broccoli and watermelon. Some of your favourite flavours include cinnamon and curry. You’re easy to please when it comes to food, that’s for sure. In the past month, you’ve developed some funny habits while eating. You constantly stroke your hair while nursing and sometimes, when you’re sitting in your high chair you flap your hands around your face. I’m not sure if you’re trying to make the same motion as you do when you’re nursing or if you’ve made some associations between the signs for “Milk”, “All done” and food. There’s no doubt that you know the word and sign for “milk” and “puppy”. Two of your favourite things.

You cut your third tooth over the past week and handled it like a champ. You were definitely more fussy and whiny than usual but it didn’t seem to affect your sleep quite as badly as your first two did. I knew another tooth was coming because you were constantly nom nom noming on your fingers. Last Saturday, I noticed the white line on your top left gum for the first time. By Tuesday, I could see a slit in your gum and by Thursday I could feel the sharpness. Yesterday we saw that it had fully cut through and so it will be no time at all until it comes all the way down and you have three big chompers. I wonder how far behind its partner will be?

You still nap twice a day, although it seems you may be in the midst of adjusting your nap schedule. With improvements in night time sleeping, I have a feeling that your sleep needs during the day are going to change. The past few weeks have been a little frustrating, but we’ll figure it out.

You love to be outside. Although we’ve had tons of rainy days, we try to get out for a walk as often as possible. Right now, your Daddy is working just down the road, so we’ve made it down to say hi to him a time or two. You sure get excited when you see your Daddy-o. You’re getting more comfortable on the grass but are also happy to chill in your stroller while we hang out with Dad in the shop, too.

As always, you are my joy. You are the most beautiful, most precious, most wonderful gift. Your Daddy and I love you, enjoy you, and are so very proud of the little girl you are becoming.

Stay sweet, my love.

Mama.

The kid can eat

Since I wrote my first post about Evalyn starting solid foods, and our adventures that go along with that, she has made leaps and bounds with her eating.

Now? My girl? Cannot get enough food. She gobbles it up. Since the day she decided that eating was cool – literally, one day she woke up and decided to eat – she has loved everything I have given her. There hasn’t been a flavour, texture or temperature that she dislikes. She will eat her food warm or cold. Pureed or table food. Spoon or finger fed. All those troubles and frustrations I had earlier? Out the window. Honestly, at this point I feel like I made a mistake starting on solids too early. I feel like I thought she should be ready, instead of watching her to see if she was ready. I’m sure if I had just waited until 6.5-7 months, it would have been a breeze. But, oh well. No harm done. She’s eating now and it’s all good.

Now the only issue we sometimes have is that she’s too excited, gets distracted and starts flailing her hands around, getting the way of the spoon or my hand.

The solution?

Two plastic stacking cups that she can hold on to and bang around while she’s eating.

She has a fairly good variety in her diet right now – at least I think so. We keep introducing new foods and flavours and so far, so good. Like I said, she hasn’t refused anything.

~

Here’s what a typical day of eating looks like for Evalyn (more for my reference in the future than anything):

7:30-8 – Nursing Session #1

8-8:30 – Breakfast – Rice, oatmeal or barley cereal mixed with pear or apple sauce and a little cinnamon. Sometimes no cereal and all fruit. Sometimes a muffin.

11:15-11:30 – Nursing session #2

11:30-12:30 – Lunch – Squash or sweet potato puree with applesauce and cinnamon or curry, small bits of baked chicken breast, steamed peas, carrots and/or green beans, chunks of peaches, pears or apples. All of this is mixed together in a bowl and she doesn’t mind the mixed flavours or textures at all.

3:30ish – Nursing session #3

4:00 – sometimes a snack. Applesauce, muffin, avocado, banana, or sweet potato sticks.

5:30ish – Supper – usually looks the exact same as lunch only more. Depending on what we’re eating, she often just eats from our table (roasted/baked veggies with herbs for example). If not, I always have stuff for her on hand.

7:15ish – Nursing session #4 – bedtime.

~

She smacks her lips, says “mmm mmm” and is starting to sign all done and possibly milk. She enjoys food. And that makes me happy. It’s exciting to enter this brand new world with her.

Baby Muffins and More

On the weekend, I tweeted about making some baby friendly muffins for Eva and quite a few of you said that you’d like the recipe. I got this recipe from my friend, Trish, who makes them for her little girl. (Trish – if you’re reading, thanks for the recipe!) My sister also makes them and has had good success with them.

They are a great on the go snack and are perfect for letting your little one practicing feeding him/herself. Eva wants so badly to feed herself but has trouble coordinating herself to get food into hand into mouth. Especially since many of the foods she is eating are slippery and difficult to pick up. Little pieces of these muffins on her tray have been working perfectly.

Here’s the recipe:

2 cups mashed banana (about 5 bananas)
1/3 cup applesauce (I added a bit more)
1 tsp. cinnamon
1 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. baking powder
1 1/2 cups brown rice flour

Mix all ingredients until well blended and smooth. Pour into greased muffin tins. Bake at 350 – for about 20 minutes (regular muffins), or 8 -10 minutes (mini muffins).

I plan on experimenting with throwing in some grated carrot and/or zucchini and possibly blueberries. My sister said she adds a little bit of butter and sometimes chocolate chips. I’m sure there are lots of variations that would be possible.

***

What else is new with us?

We enjoyed an amazing weekend full of time with our friends. Glen and Rachel ventured up from Ohio for a visit before their little one makes her arrival in September. On Saturday night, there was a house warming party for C-Biscuit and Big Burd so we all enjoyed that. The theme was “Superheroes” and we were supposed to dress up.

I got really creative and went as Super Mom. And do you know how hard it is to come up with a superhero costume for a baby?

One trip to Once Upon a Child and $2.50 later, Eva made her appearance as “Super Peacock”.

***

I had a wonderful first Mother’s Day. Eva surprised me with a beautiful gift of sleep. I brought her home from the party to put her down around 7 on Saturday night and then left her with a sitter when I went back. I only stayed a few more hours, and came home so I knew I’d be back in time to feed her. But, she never woke up. So I went to bed. And then … it was morning. For the first time ever, she slept straight through the night. 7pm-7am. Happy Mama’s Day to me. (For the record, it did not continue last night).

Evan and Eva got me a new bread maker for Mother’s day so I am very excited to resume my bread making. By 8:15 this morning, I already had a batch of cheddar beer bread in the oven. Yeah, that’s right, I cracked open a Bud Light at 8 am on Monday morning.

***

The weather this weekend was beautiful. So beautiful, in fact, that I have a sunburn. Yikes. Time to start being careful. The forecast is calling for a string of nice days, so I’m hoping to get out lots and lots.

Bring on the sunscreen!

Happy Monday, friends.

7 Months

Dear Evalyn,

Today, you are 7 months old. And, girl, have we loved you this month. Well, obviously we’ve loved you every month, but this month has been extra remarkable. And considering you were sick for about 2.5 weeks and cut your first two teeth, you have clearly done some fun stuff for me to come out of the month saying it was remarkable.

Here’s how you’ve looked this month:

You are just oh so much fun right now. You have changed and learned so much over the past few weeks. You now give kisses by blowing raspberries on our cheeks, hands and lips. You ask to give people (or puppies or stuffed animals) a kiss by making the blowing noise while looking at me. And when you’re not giving kisses, you’ve got your cheeks full of air and are making a funny fart sound all the time.

Although we haven’t had a doctor’s appointment to get an official weight, according to Nana’s scale it appears that you are hovering just around the 17 pound mark. You are wearing size 6-12 and 9 month clothes (although still fit into some 3-6 stuff) and are  wearing size 4 disposable diapers. You could have stayed in size 3 a while longer, but I didn’t want to open a huge box knowing we wouldn’t get through them, so I moved you on up. We still haven’t moved you up a snap size on your CDs in either the diaper or the cover but they’re getting tight so I’m sure we will do that soon.

You are really starting to figure out how to get yourself on the move! You have been rolling for months, but lately, you have started to figure out how to get places on purpose. You are scooting like mad up on your hands and toes, and every once in a while, you get the crawl just right for a few strides before toppling over.

You go from your tummy to sitting fairly easily now. You can do it especially well when you are naked or in a disposable diaper. The restricted flexibility of your cloth diapers makes it a bit more difficult, but you’re starting to figure it out. You can also get yourself from sitting up to your tummy, back or hands and knees without bonking your head most of the time. Usually, you go from your tummy, to downward dog, and then twist your bum to the side so you are sitting up. We’ve even caught you sitting up in the tub once or twice. And last night? You tried to pull yourself to standing in the tub. No thank you! Slow down, girlfriend.

Although you still don’t move everywhere or with a great deal of speed, there are a few things that you will always move very quickly for – one of our iPhones, my laptop, my camera, or a can of pop. Looks like you have more in common with your Mama than we ever realized. Mommy and Daddy are learning that we now have to be very careful with where we put things. You are already starting to become very mischievous. Somehow, that little mind of yours can easily figure out what belongs to you and what doesn’t, and you become intent on getting a hold of the things that aren’t yours.

After being quite sick with a nasty cold for about two and a half weeks, we thought we were all finally feeling better and starting to sleep better when things went downhill again. At first, I thought it was just going to take some time to break some of the habits we created while we were sick but then on Saturday April 9th I realized it was something else when your two bottom teeth popped through your gums.

You have started eating solid food quite a bit this month. We’ve had an adventure in starting solid foods but you’re really catching on and love your food now! Things you have had include: bananas, avocado, pears, apples, green beans, butternut squash, sweet potatoes, white potatoes, green peas, carrots, Mum Mums, rice cereal and oatmeal cereal. You usually prefer to feed yourself but if you’re really hungry and I can convince you that what I’ve got is good stuff then you will let me feed you with my fingers or sometimes with a spoon. Most of the stuff you eat is just small bits of table foods, although we are still trying to sneak in some baby foods here and there, as well.

You love to drink water from your cup like a big girl. Even after two weeks of it, I still find myself in awe of how big you look when you hold the cup and gulp the water from the straw.

We are still going strong with breast feeding. Most days, you nurse when you get up around 8, after your morning nap around noon, after your afternoon nap around 3:30 and at bedtime around 7:15. Then you usually wake up between 10-11 to eat and (knock on wood) have been going until about 5-6 am until you eat again (although you have still been waking up in the middle most nights). Then you go back to sleep for a few hours and we start our day around 7:30-8.

You do two good naps a good. Thank you for that, Baby. On average, you sleep about 1.5-2 hours in both the morning and the afternoon. Some days are different, but that’s your normal pattern. You don’t usually have a third nap anymore unless you happen to wake up really early from your afternoon nap, we’re going out and you need an extra rest first, or we’re in the car where you sometimes still doze off.

I have started working on word recognition and some signs with you. You are you definitely starting to respond to both. You seem to respond to your name as well as to the words, Mommy, Daddy, hi, puppy, milk, and jump. You laugh anytime I tell you “no”, so I’m hoping that soon you will start to understand what it means and that it’s NOT funny and Mama means business. I have a feeling, though, that you might always laugh at me when I say the n-o word.

As far as signs go, you definitely understand milk (as in, when I sign/say milk you start laughing like a mad woman until I get the b**b in your mouth), and I think you’re beginning to catch on to eat and all done, as well. Sometimes it’s hard to tell if you actually understand the words or are just laughing at your crazy mommy when she’s flailing her arms around in your face.

Speaking of laughing, you’ve been laughing more than ever and just recently you’ve developed two new laughs that we sure get a kick out of. Throughout the day, you are almost always chuckling to yourself. We don’t even have to do anything to prompt it. You just sit there and do this deep, “huh huh huh” chuckle. This is the laugh that greets me every time I come into your room to get you out of your crib. You’ve also started a scream-y laugh when you are excited. Like, if we couldn’t see your face and only heard your voice we would think you were ticked off. But your face shows otherwise. You like to do this scream when we wave to you, when you see your puppy (whom you adore now, by the way), and when you are around other kids.

You are your Daddy’s girl. Speaking of your Daddy, do you know how awesome he is? I know you do. You love playing with him more than anyone in the world and we are so blessed that Daddy works so hard so that you and I can enjoy this time in your life together at home.

There is nothing more I can say but that you are my joy.

We are blessed and grateful that God has considered us worthy to have you entrusted to us for this time on earth.

We love you. We hope for you. We dream for you. And we pray for you.

Here’s to another great month, sweet girl. It just keeps getting better.

Love,

Mama

Adventures in Eating

Eva’s big 7 month birthday is just around the corner (eek), so the past month has been very tied up in introducing solid foods and starting to incorporate eating food into our daily routine.

About a month and a half ago, I spent a few hours making some baby food. Not too much. Just some butternut squash, sweet potatoes, green beans, and pears. Just enough to get started. I had planned on writing a series of blog posts about making baby food. But I don’t think that’s going to happen. Why? Well, because my stubborn little child wants absolutely nothing to do with baby food of any sort.

When I first started cereal around 5 months, I just figured that she wasn’t quite ready. So I cooled it for awhile. Then I tried again. Still nothing. So I decided to give banana and avocado a try, rather than the traditional cereal. I mashed it up, mixed it with breast milk and offered it to her on a spoon. Nothing.

She looked excited when she saw food. She was constantly grabbing for our food. She didn’t shudder at the taste when I did manage to get some into her mouth. But? She was not getting any better at accepting the spoon.

Eventually, we started to realize that she just wasn’t interested in being spoon fed. So I gave her the mesh feeder. And oh glory day! She went nuts. She loved (loves) chewing on that thing.

Next, I picked up a package of Mum Mums and offered her one. Five minutes? Gobbled that thing up. After seeing her interest in eating something she could hold herself, I decided to trick her. I spread mushed avocado all over a Mum Mum and gave it to her. Success! She devoured it.

Since then, she has made so much progress eating solid foods. Since I have a few bags of frozen food cubes that I don’t want to waste, I either give them to her frozen in the mesh feeder or we feed them to her using a Mum Mum as a spoon. And it works. Wonderfully. She obviously loves the taste of everything we’ve given her so far. There are no shudders or sour faces. She smiles and hollers when I ask her if she wants something to eat. She responds to the sign for “eat”. She’s so interested in food. She is just so not interested in me feeding her food.

For a long time, she wouldn’t even accept something that I held in my fingers and tried to put in her mouth (like a small piece of banana for example). She would however, eat food from Evan’s hands and even sometimes off a spoon from him. It seems Little Miss thinks Mommy is good for milk and nothing else. Now that she’s a little more accustomed to eating, she will sometimes take food from my hands, but still refuses a spoon from me. Thankfully, Daddy is home most nights for dinner to help but that still leaves me figuring out creative ways to help her eat breakfast and lunch. I just try to maximize our efforts on days when other people are around during meal time because she loves to show off how well she eats for anyone other than me.

Little Miss Independent loves to eat anything she can hold herself. Steamed sweet potato sticks, steamed apple slices, pieces of banana, avocado and, if she’s really lucky, a delicious Mum Mum. Mostly I just set these things on her tray, let her pick them up and gum at them. She gums off small pieces and works away at them until she can swallow them. Of course, I help her out along the way. And the things that she can’t eat pick up and eat on her own quite yet, like green beans and peas, she either eats frozen in the mesh feeder or on a Mum Mum “spoon”.

We have also learned that it’s important for us to make a better effort to sit together at the table instead of eating dinner at the breakfast nook because she seems to know the difference. She likes family dinner and is way more interested in sitting up to the table with us.

She loves drinking water from her cup, as well. We tried a few different cups but the Playtex learner with a straw is definitely the favourite. She figured it out within 30 seconds of me giving it to her for the first time. With the other cups, she knew to hold the handles and put the spout in her mouth, but she couldn’t figure out that she had to tip her head back to get the water to come out. With the straw, she doesn’t have to move her head and uses the same motion that she uses to nurse to drink the water. She gets excited when she sees her cup and is starting to respond to the word and sign “drink”. Doesn’t she look so stinking grown up drinking from her big girl cup?

Introducing solids has certainly been an adventure. I keep having to remind myself that for now, food is just for fun, and that her main nutrition still comes from breast milk. Keeping this in mind helps me to take a more relaxed approach – letting her take the lead.

I’m sure within the next month or so, girlfriend will be gobbling up everything she can get her hands on. And now that she has two chompers, table food will become easier and easier for her to eat.

What can I say? My Little Miss is a stubborn, independent little booger. She wants to be a big girl. She even wants to order from the adult menu when she goes out for lunch with her Nana.

6 Months

My Dearest Evalyn,

You are a whopping 6 months old now! I don’t know how it is possible that it has been half a year since the day I gave birth to you.

You now weigh 16 lbs 5 ounces and are 26 1/4 inches long with a head circumference of 43 cm. You are still so tall, which is funny since both Mommy and Daddy are kinda short. You are wearing mostly 9 month clothes. Some of them are a bit too big, but they fit better than the 6. Mama cried a few weeks ago when she packed up all of your 6 month clothes. Why are you growing up so stinkin’ fast? You are still in size 3 diapers and haven’t moved up a setting on your cloth diapers in quite a while.

Here’s how you’ve changed this month:

You are transforming into such a goofy, sweet, mischievous little lady. Sometimes, I look at you and find myself so shocked at how grown up you seem.

This past month has perhaps been the one with the most dramatic changes. It seems like every day you are doing something new. You have learned how to get up on your hands and knees and are starting to rock back and forth. On slippery floors, you zoom backwards and on carpeted floors, you can sometimes figure out how to lunge yourself forward. You are going to be crawling in no time, I suspect.

A week and a half ago, you started sitting up on your own. You also let the world know that you are Elvis’ love child. As long as you get your balance right, you can sit by yourself for a few minutes before toppling over. You’ve become a master of the face plant. But you don’t mind.

We have recently started venturing into the world of solids. You have had rice cereal, banana, avocado, sweet potato, butternut squash and pears. Some days you gobble it up and other days you want nothing to do with it. You nurse anywhere from 4-6 times a day and I still love love love that special time that we share. It’s so easy, comfortable and natural for us now. We’ve come a long way.

In my eyes, you are just plain cute.

Both Mommy and Daddy love to cuddle you.

You are still an excellent napper. Your nights? Not so excellent sometimes. Things are very inconsistent but that’s okay – we’ll figure it out eventually. You nap two (sometimes three) times a day, and most often, they are good solid naps. These kind of naps make for a happy mommy!

You are the light of my life. Every day is filled with new adventures, more joy, and a greater depth of love than I have ever known.

I love watching you grow, learn and explore. I can’t wait for all of the new adventures that lie ahead of us in the coming month.

Always yours,

Mama