A week or two ago, we bought her some rice cereal and mashed up some bananas, thinking that she was more than ready. She was grabbing at our food, trying to snag a bite of Hoot's toast, scooting around at warp-speed to get to our snacks. We assumed she was trying to tell us something.
Turns out, we were wrong.
We tried to give her some of her delicious banana/rice cereal concoction.
She acted like we were feeding her poison.
When Hayden started solid foods, she was all of 4 months old. She wasn't a strapping young woman like her sister, but just a little sprite of a thing. We took her to her 4 month appointment only to find that she had not gained an ounce in two months, despite having grown 3 inches. I was in no way willing to give her any formula, so I decided that since I was starving my kid with my skim milk, we would throw in some rice cereal, some avocado, some veggies, fruit, etc. and see what would happen. Hayden was an eager and willing participant from the start, and actually screamed when we weren't shoveling her food in fast enough. She ate everything (except green beans) and relished it. By eight months, through a combination of baby mush and something known as "baby-led weaning" or "baby-led solids" and nursing like mad-women every two hours whether she asked or not, she was back on track. She remained a string bean, but was growing.
I assumed that we would have a similar situation with Baby #2....
Boy was I surprised when Bug became the "Meatball" to Hoot's "String-bean"!! We have a good thing going here - based on her hulking 17.5 pound weigh-in at the doctor, I am not starving this one! LOL So I waited to give her the mush.
Then it was an epic fail.
No one ever said that being the Head Chef for this bunch was easy.
So, after several more tries with the mush, all yielding similar results, I headed back to the drawing board.
Yesterday, I returned from the garage (where I was grabbing the sweet nectar that keeps this mother a float on any given day, aka Diet Pepsi) to find my two little ladies, huddled around a small pile of Goldfish crackers, both happily chewing.
Bug was eating Goldfish.
First I freaked. She is too little!! Then it dawned on me that she actually isn't. She was actually enjoying it.
So I regrouped. Turns out that I have a baby who hates baby food, likes finger foods and LOVES the boob. And that is fine by me.
Here she is sampling some avocado slices, a graham cracker, and a couple of green beans.
(For whatever reason, this thumbnail makes the video look like it is all about Hoot, but it is mostly Bugster and a small cameo from Daddy...)
Here is another little sneak peek at our girl, eating dinner with the family.
I am just relaxing, letting her explore. Letting her try things at her own pace, learn to truly enjoy eating. I am not shoveling the food in anymore. Right now, she is clearly getting enough calories from the boob, and the fact is that she is mostly putting the food in, chewing and sucking, and working it back out of her mouth. And that is fine for now.
This is just another reminder that Rule #1 of Motherhood is as follows:
"Just when you think you know what you're doing,
something will remind you that you really don't have a clue.
But it's okay. You'll figure it out. After all, you da mom."
