How to eat cereal

Here's how to eat a bowl of cheerios with fruit and milk according to Boo:

Remove cheerios and fruit from bowl and set on table.
Drink milk out of bowl.
Hold up bowl and ask for "mo muk".
Finally pick cheerios off of table and eat one at a time along with fruit.

Gotta love it!

Reflecting on the Journey

Boo is now 17 months old. He eats a variety of foods with a variety of textures and flavors. I have always offered a variety of things, whether they appeared "kid friendly" or not. The one alteration I make is that things are not as spicy as I would like them. This is both for the benefit of my husband and for Boo. Boo has tried spicy salsas and stuff though when I have them out. And I would say it's looking like he's going to take after his mama in that department!

Would I do BLW again? Absolutely. Boo always has been in charge of what goes into his mouth. He's always been able to select from his tray what he wants. If he doesn't eat much of a certain meal or even on a certain day he makes up for it. I've never had a problem with Boo being able to handle a food that he could get into his mouth. If it was something he wasn't ready to swallow he just spit it out after tasting it. No harm done. Granted, some obvious hazards were not given to him. It does require some common sense.

We will continue with BLW and the spirit of BLW will live long after he's weaned. I hope that food continues to feel adventurous to him and that he continues to live tasting a wide variety of foods.

Boo Amazes Me

Boo continues to amaze me with the variety of foods that he will eat. Yesterday's daycare menu had a couple of new foods on it. We had Italian Bread and Cheese Soup. It was so yummy! I'd post the recipe, but I got it from a cookbook, so I'm pretty sure that would be a copyright violation. I got it out of a cookbook entitled, "Simple Suppers." It's a Moosewood Restaurant cookbook. Boo loved his soup and scarfed it down. Of course he ate the cheese off of the top first and then ate the rest of the soup. He loves cheese!

Afternoon snack was green olive tapenade on whole grain melba. I didn't have high hopes with this one. Nope - he scarfed it down. I'd love to say that it was this lovely homemade tapenade, but no, it was a jar of store bought tapenade. He actually ate the tapenade first and then started in on the melba. Although, that's the way he does with almost any topping!

Sick Boo and Thankful To Be Nursing

Sadly Boo has not been eating much these past few days. He's sick. He has an ear infection and a sinus infection. I've tried to get him to eat and he'll take a bite here and there, but mostly just throws it. He's nursing like a newborn though. I'm really thankful that he's still nursing actually because that's about all he'll eat right now while sick. He will drink water also. Interestingly enough, I tried Pedialyte and he won't touch it. He'll drink his water, but not Pedialyte. I really think the nursing has helped though as I've been watching him for signs of dehydration. He's got a bit of diarrhea due to the antibiotic.

All in all, I'm thankful to be nursing him still. I think I'd be a lot more panicked about his level of food intake if he wasn't nursing right now. Not to mention he feels like complete crap and it's so comforting to him. Nothing comforts him like a nursing session does. I would encourage anyone who tries to do BLW to try extended nursing along with it. I'm a little amazed at how natural it all seems and how much we both seem to enjoy this.

How to eat a rice cake w/ almond butter and banana

According to Boo:


1. Pick off banana slices and put on side of plate.
2. Pick off almond butter with fingers and suck off until rice cake is almost clean.
3. Eat rice cake.

Chili

Given the cooler weather I felt that it was time for a nice pot of chili. So I threw everything together this morning and set the crockpot to go. It was a great lunch for the daycare, as I didn't have to mess with it much. I did tweak the recipe a bit. The recipe is one that I found online. Here's a link:

Crock Pot Chili Recipe

I added a few more cans of diced tomatoes, a couple of cans of tomato paste, and some water. I don't like my chili thick. If you like thick chili then I'd leave this recipe alone as far as that goes. I didn't add the jalopenos as I had two toddlers partaking. I especially wasn't sure how the dc kiddo would do with spice, so I kept the "kick factor" down a bit. I added 1/2 teaspoon less tabasco. I think if I was making this just for the family, I'd add the jalopeno, the amount of tabasco in the recipe, and a bit more chili powder. But anyways, it turned out absolutely delicious!

If I'd been thinking about it I would've taken pictures. Both boys decided that their chili did not belong in the bowl, but on the table. What a mess!

Sitting at the Big Boy Table

For at least 2, maybe 3 weeks Boo has been eating many meals at a small table instead of the highchair. I'm in the process of building a home daycare business and we have one full-time dc kid right now who's a few months older than Boo. Boo is now 15 months old. So I decided to try them on the table as previously Boo was in a highchair and the dc kiddo was in a booster seat. Well, he does wonderfully at the table. He definitely needs reminders to sit at the table, but I think he does wonderful. For dinner he's often in the highchair simply because we're eating at the big table as a family. But I think it's great that he's gotten so much practice eating at a real table. He also does really well with an open cup. Yes, there are still times when he chooses to dump his drink all over himself rather than drink it. But overall, he does really well. I know I'm boasting here. I can't help it. I get so proud of all the little things that he learns to do!

He is a bit pickier now that he's a big toddler, but he still does really great overall. There are some days where he looks at a food and I can just hear his brain saying, "Really? This is for lunch. You've got to be kidding me."

Plates, silverware, and cups...oh my!

Vow to Self

- From here on out, I'm going to be better at giving Boo plates, silverware, and open cups to experiment with. I'm going to try not to just throw food on his tray as though it were a trough. I'm going to actually remember to get out a plate and place his food nicely on the plate, even if it only stays there for a short while. I'm going to give him silverware so that he can at least recognize there's another option aside from fingers (even if he chooses not to try it). I'm going to give him his open cup more because the cheesy grin he gives when he gets to slop water all over himself from the open cup is just priceless.

Eating on the Run

There's a problem in our eating that I'm struggling to fix. Whenever we get busy, meaning if we have anything going on during the evening at all, we end up eating out. And it's so awful. Usually the food is not very healthy. It's expensive and we really can't afford to eat out that often anyways. But I find that this happens over and over because the majority of what I buy is just not quick to prepare. So I'm trying to figure out what to do about this. I think it's really putting a wrench in the works as far as the healthy eating goes. Perhaps I would start to see some change in my health if it weren't for the eating out. And yes, this problem happens pretty regularly. And it's not stuff Boo should be eating either. I don't want him to get in the habit of eating junk just because he's in a hurry. And honestly, sometimes it's not because I'm in a hurry. Sometimes this happens because I'm just tired and can't imagine dragging myself into the kitchen to fix a meal. So, I need to figure this out for us to be more successful in our journey of healthy eating and teaching Boo good eating habits.

Almondapplicious Banana Grill

That's what I'm calling what we had for lunch today. I used sourdough bread. On one side was almond butter. The other side I put unsweetened applesauce. For the filling I cut thin slices of banana - I think it could be overkill if the banana was too thick. I then grilled this just like you would a grilled cheese. This was so yummy. Boo and I both approved. Although Boo prefers to pull his sandwich apart and eat the insides, then suck on the bread!

Quinoa Pilaf with Feta

We had this last night. So, Boo loved this and I loved it. T hated it. He's fed up with the vegetarian meals...LOL! I got it out of a Moosewood Restaurant Cookbook entitled "Simple Suppers." Someone recommended it to me and I think it's pretty great!

And by the way, quinoa is pronounced "keen-wa". Oops...and all this time I was saying "quin-oh-uh". My bad. A friend recommended this product and I'm glad that we tried it. It was super easy to prepare and I could definitely see this going with a lot of things.

We had the leftovers for breakfast this morning as we got around pretty late and I just didn't feel like making much, what with my recently sprained ankle and all. Yes, I'm afraid that it's made me quite lazy!

No Battles

You know one thing I really appreciate about BLW thus far. No battles. He eats what he wants and leaves what he doesn't. I really think that's the way to go. I know there's people that would disagree and go on about nutrition and this and that. I could see that if I was giving him veggies and ice cream all the time and he chooses to eat only the ice cream. But I'm making healthy choices for our family and he's being exposed to those healthy things. I'm not saying that I've never made a bad choice, because we ordered pizza over the weekend. So, I am human. BUT, overall he's presented with healthy items and he picks and chooses which of them to eat. I feel that it's extremely respectful of him as a person. I mean, I'd be pissed if someone told me I HAD to eat brussel sprouts. I HATE them and I know I'll make up that nutrition in other ways.

As Boo gets older I plan to continue the spirit of BLW. Granted he won't be a baby anymore. But I don't think that once he's two or three or whatever we'll all of a sudden decide now we have to change the way he's presented with food. I grew up under the "clean your plate" mentality. And look where that got me. I'm just in the past year learning how to make healthy choices and prepare healthy meals. I'm proud to say that I now shop the perimeter of the grocery store, which is the "healthy" thing to do. I also incorporate lots of vegetables and legumes into our diet. I'm getting better at it as I do this more and more. But anyways, my point is that if I'm just now learning how to eat healthy at 29 years old, then the "clean your plate" mentality did nothing for me as far as healthy eating goes. Just something to consider.

Some food for thought. Okay - I just HAD to throw in the bad pun!

Yesterday's Picnic

Yesterday we had a picnic. Boo ate really nicely. He sat on the blanket for part of the picnic and then he sat on my lap for a bit too. He had cold sesame noodles. I got the recipe off of one of the vegetarian blogs I've been reading:

Cold Sesame Noodle recipe

You'll have to do a search, but you'll find it. Anyways, it's a great recipe. I've made it twice in the past couple of weeks as we strive to be more vegetarian-like lately. Boo loves it even though it's got a bit of a kick to it with the red pepper flakes. It was perfect to take to a picnic.

I took some homemade salsa with my fresh garden tomatoes. YUMMM!!! This is the first time that I've gotten to make my salsa with tomatoes from my garden. It was so good. Anyways, Boo had a bit of that on top of some melba toast.

And then of course he had blueberries. It wouldn't be a summer picnic without some fresh fruit. He did so well sitting on the blanket and eating. I was pretty impressed with him!

Cleaning Boo

I decided to post this as there were some questions about cleaning children during the BLW process. I am by no means an expert. I've just found some things that work for us and if it can help someone else in their journey, then that's wonderful. Anyways, first thing that helps is a good highchair. Nothing with cloth. I've never had a highchair with cloth on it, but I can only imagine the horrible mess it would be. Crevices are bad too as they will get filled with gunk. We use the antilop highchair from IKEA and I couldn't be happier with the choice. There are some cuter options out there, but honestly, I don't feel a need to have something with animal or nursery print in the middle of my kitchen. Here's a link to the highchair in case you're looking for one:

IKEA Highchair

The tray comes separately so be sure to get the tray also!

Good full-coverage bibs. I've read on my BLW yahoo group that some people are using muslin tied around the baby. I think that would also do the job quite nicely. Here's what I use:

I-Play Bibs

One thing I've done is put some soap and water in a spray bottle. I use Dr. Bronner's, but you can use any mild soap that you like. Often I will spray Boo down before he even leaves the highchair. Then I may follow with a wet paper towel. If he's not that messy I may skip the initial spraying and just carry him to the sink to wash his hands in the faucet. One day after blackberries I just plopped his entire body into the sink for an impromptu bath. Most days though I just get what I can. If there's food dangling from his hair I'll scrub his head with the cloth and get the food out and send him on his way to play!

So hopefully this will be helpful to someone in the journey of BLW!

Toddlerhood

Well, it's been a long time. I'm afraid that I've neglected this blog. Bad bad. And here I had this vision of helping to bring BLW to moms in the US. I guess I have to keep up the blog if I'm going to be of inspiration to everybody.

So here's where we're at. Boo loves to eat and I get excited about the variety of things that he loves. He's tried my homemade salsa - which does have a bit of a kick to it - and he loves it. Just this last week I discovered that he LOVES chickpeas and lentils. The chickpeas I shouldn't be suprised as he loves humus. The lentils he really chowed down on. We tried scrambled tofu today...a new one for both of us. Boo LOVED it and so did I. It was extremely tasty.

I can tell he's entering toddlerhood though in that he definitely has those picky days that are so typical of this stage. There are days that he'd eat nothing but fruit if he could. In the spirit of BLW I try to let him pick and choose for himself. However, I've found that if fruit is part of the meal I must hide it until the end. I found out the hard way that too much fruit makes for really awful diapers. And since we're doing cloth diapering it's even worse. I won't go into detail, but I'm sure you can imagine!

We're in "extended breastfeeding" now. In the US pretty much anything past a year is considered "extended breastfeeding." How sad since so many other countries don't think anything of breastfeeding beyond a year. So Boo is 13 months now. I haven't gotten any weird looks yet for continuing to nurse him, but I imagine as he gets older the looks will come. The World Health Organization recommends that children be breastfed until the age of two at least. So that's my goal. I really want as much as possible to allow Boo to take the lead on his weaning, rather than forcing my own agenda on him. I've been trying to do some reading on extended breastfeeding. Perhaps when I get some time I'll post some links to articles and such.

Eating Machine

Boo is an eating machine. He doesn't turn his nose up at too many things. According to grandma, he does not like honeydew melon or brussel sprouts. I'm not with him during the day so I haven't seen him try these foods yet, but I can't say I blame him on either accounts. I don't care for honeydew or brussel sprouts. He loves avocado which grosses grandma out to no end. She hates avocado.

Dinner can be hit or miss depending on how busy the night gets. I'm trying to be more consistent with it. But I do keep reminding myself "Food is for fun until one." That's my favorite BLW saying and I repeat it to myself when I'm feeling incompetent due to a less than wonderful spread for that night's dinner. It's very hard to be a working mother and accomplish all of the tasks that I want to do in a day. And BLW can be messy and time-consuming. I think it's time consuming in that you're not able to just spoon-feed something in quickly. However, it saves time because baby eats at the same time that you do! It's just the mess afterwards that gets a bit old. But it's all in the fun of being a parent I suppose.

Boo loves baked beans. He thinks they're wonderful. I'm not a fan of baked beans and it's not something we have often at all. But he's had them two or three times.

I let him try a bit of dairy now that he's a bit older. Just some cheese. He thinks cheese is pretty spectacular. Is there a kid out there that doesn't like cheese?

Well, anyways, this is just a little bit of this and that to kind of talk about our progress.

Boo's First Highchair Meal

Well, our highchair came yesterday. We got the Antilop highchair from IKEA. The price is right and it's nice because there are no crevices. So it's spray and wipe. Very easy to clean. And we sure put it to the test. Last night was tacos. Silly mommy only bought hard shells, so Boo didn't get any taco shell. But he got taco meat (ground beef), black refried beans, and homemade guacamole. Boy did he love that! I got pics, but of course will have to wait to get them developed. He was quite a mess by the time that he was done. I didn't know where to start! One thing about BLW is it is very very messy. I think I've griped about that before. I wouldn't trade it for anything though because he LOVES his food. None of this spitting it out at us or trying to push it away. He can't get to it fast enough most days. He eats such a variety of things too. Grandma's been doing a great job giving him breakfast and lunch. While I'm not so naive to think she's not sneaking in some spoon feeding here and there, she really does follow the self-feeding quite well. So I'm pretty excited about that. He's definitely with great people while I work. But I guess that's off topic. Well, anyways, I have to run. I just wanted to update again!

So Many Foods, So Little Time

Hello there! I am guilty of getting behind on my blogging. I admit that since returning to work this has dropped on my priority list a bit. I really do want to learn to keep up with these blogs though. So I'll keep trying.

As far as BLW goes, Boo has had many wonderful things. He eats all three meals a day now. He started breakfasts a couple of weeks ago when I started work. So far it's usually english muffin with fruit or oatmeal with fruit. Although, he doesn't seem to be a big fan of his oatmeal. And lunch was started this week. At this point I'm very unadventurous with lunch and it's usually dinner leftovers from the night before.

Here's some thinks Boo has had:

Steak and smashed potatoes with gravy. He loved sucking on the steak. He absolutely adored the smashed potatoes with gravy. He kept looking at me with this smile on his face. I think he would've been happy just to eat a big pile of gravy, but I won't cater to that!

He's had garlic bread and really thought that was wonderful.

He's had honey mustard chicken.

He's had asparagus and green beans.

BBQ Beef Brisket, baked beans, and cornbread. That was tonight's meal.

I have some film developed that has pics of him eating. As soon as I get the chance I'll post some of those on here.

Oh, and I must say that grandma is doing much better with the BLW. She's the one that feeds him most of the time since I work full time now and has been pretty cooperative. Now I'm not naive enough to think that she doesn't help him along with a spoon on occasion. But I'm going to pick my battles and let this one slide.

Boo has not been starving this week

Hello! I just wanted to inform everyone that Boo has not been starving this week. I have been feeding him. I started a new job on Monday and we're still adjusting here. I am planning on keeping this blog going. I feel that it's really important to have as many resources as possible about BLW, so I'm pretty motivated to work on this. So I imagine that the longer I work I will get into a routine that works and be able to keep up a bit better.

As far as Boo's eating goes we did add in breakfast this week. Especially with me working I wanted him to have more opportunity to eat solids as it's really hard to pump enough milk for him every day. I've done it so far though. Yay!

For breakfast Boo has had oatmeal pretty much every morning this week. Boring that it's the same, but I'll try him out on pancakes this weekend and try to make up a bunch and freeze them.

Dinner was pretty boring most times. Last night was something new. I made honey mustard chicken wings. I know you're not supposed to give honey to infants, but the honey was cooked, so I imagine that's different. Anyways, he just got strips of the meat, not the skin anyways. He really seemed to like the chicken. And then he got some steamed broccoli with that.

Ham

Well, we did ham for dinner. Today was my first day at work since Boo's arrival and in the interest of making it easy on myself I threw a bunch of ham and cannelini beans with some water in a crockpot this morning and let it stew all day. I gave Boo some of the ham. Honestly it wasn't a great choice. I think the ham was way too salty. I didn't add any salt, but I cooked it with the bone for maximum flavor and it turned out pretty salty. I don't think Boo ate enough of it for this to be a problem, but I think I'm going to hold off on ham for quite some time. He really wasn't that interested in eating tonight either. Usually he's so excited. He got his usual initial excitement, but it died out really quickly. I think it had to do with me going back to work today. Today was my first day back at work and Boo was really anxious to see me. He kept trying to grab my hand and play with it and was more interested in me than the food. So his excitement with his food died away quickly and he signaled me to let him out. His signal usually consists of rocking in his chair and ignoring his food. So it's just as well since ham wasn't a great choice in the first place. So we just had a short dinner with lots of quality time and cuddles afterwards.