Baby Food

I can’t remember if I wrote this post already: forgive my memory. 

As I mentioned in a previous post I had aspirations of making my baby’s food (I think I only mentioned it and didn’t write a full thesis on it!) That way she would only have fresh food with no preservatives.  And I would save money.  And it is SUPER easy with the awesome Baby Breeza that our awesome friends the Lonergans gave us.  I mean you put the food in the machine, push a few buttons, and poof!  You have baby food.  The Breeza steams and purees it for you.  The only problem is my baby does not like to eat the wonderful food I make her!

The pediatrician wanted us to start feeding her baby food at 4 months.  But based on the American Pediatric Association baby’s should have exclusive breast milk for the first 6 months (ideally).  So I decided we would wait.  At 5.5 months, she seemed interested in what we were doing during dinner time so we decided we would give it a shot.  The pediatrician said we could start with whatever we wanted, fruits, vegetables, and that rice cereal had no benefits at all.  Again, I decided I didn’t like this advice and I would stick with rice cereal.  So we got the camera ready, mixed the cereal, and put Matt’s childhood bib on the sweet baby. 

She loved every bite.  And Matt filmed every bite!

This love of baby food lasted about a week. 

During this week we learned she does not like peas.  Other things (butternut squash, pears, bananas, carrots, oatmeal) were not loved or hated. 

After talking to everyone I know who has a child, my two cousin pediatricians, my pediatrician, my sister, my sister in law, my mom, everyone said don’t get stressed and just keep trying.  So I just kept trying.  And she just kept her mouth closed!  I finally decided I needed to give up my goal of making baby food and refocusing my goal on getting my baby to eat food.  So I bought some Gerber First Foods.  I bought peas, pears, sweet potatoes, applesauce, peaches, and carrots.  I bought new flavors and flavors she had tried before to figure out if she hated eating or hated eating my cooking (lots of tantrums in our future if this is the case J ). 





The same thing happened with the processed food, at first.  She would eat one bite willingly and then not really eat anymore.  She was unimpressed with the sweet potatoes.  She seemed to possibly like the peaches, pears, and carrots.  And she did not like the peas (clearly my daughter!)  She did like to eat small pieces of banana which made me think it was a texture situation and that she would never like to eat purees.

On Tuesday, I went to the dentist and my friend babysat the baby.  She was able to get her to eat carrots!  I asked her what she did and she said she warmed it slightly.  So the next night I warmed her carrots and she ate some!  She even ate some cereal.  I still had to trick her and shove the spoon in whenever she opened her mouth.  But this was progress. 



Wednesday when I was eating my cereal, the baby and the dog were both staring at me longingly and drooling, so I figured I would try to feed her at the same time.  She ate the cereal!  She even opened her mouth, asking for more!  I was so shocked and excited.  That night we tried the rest of the carrots and she wasn’t super excited but she ate two bites.

Today was very successful!  We had pears for breakfast.  She ate all the food without any tricks! She opened her mouth and asked for more. I couldn’t believe three meals in a row she actually ate food!  I gave her some bananas for lunch.  And for dinner she ate some cereal and confirmed that she hated peas!

So, we after trying for several weeks, we finally have some success.  Next step, seeing if she will eat the food I made her!





One day the baby will be able to enjoy our grill masterpiece!