Adventures in Eating

A few days after Max hit five months, we embarked on a major milestone event - eating food!

For the last five months Max has had nothing but plain old Similac formula, so we were excited to see how he would take to real live food. There are about a million different ways to introduce solids, so I won't get into all that crazy decision making here (plus our pediatrician seemed pretty loosey goosey about it)...but we are tentatively giving purees a shot for now and hope to add in some baby led weaning down the road.  (So...just so we're on the same page, baby led weaning means instead of mashing up food and feeding via spoon, we would let Max take the lead, and try whole foods at his own speed...even without teeth!)

So we stripped him down (he does still have a diaper on, despite appearing deliciously naked in photos), plopped him in the baby seat, and busted out the cameras to watch and record as the first feeding commenced.  Warning: Prepare yourself for unreasonable cuteness.

 

So..since we decided to try purees first - it seemed a natural choice to go with rice cereal. The whole time I was mixing it - I was thinking, this looks so unappetizing.  Literally, like wall paper paste.  And, since we have no clue what we're doing - we just put it on the spoon and expected him to gobble it down.  Hisfaces were classic. He kept looking at us like we had all made some terrible mistake. Surely this wasn't for eating, and could we please help her get this horrible stuff off of his tongue?! We stuck with it for two more days...and then decided to switch things up. 

 

Because I'm winging this whole parenting thing - I saw three ripe bananas on my counter and thought...what the heck - let's see what he thinks!  First, I cut up some slices...

 

and encouraged him to try it.  I was thinking he would be a natural, as pretty much anything that comes into his little paws ends up in his mouth, but he was slow to embrace this new slimey treat.  He cautiously and thoroughly inspected it.

 

 

When he was brave enough to pick it up and put it in his mouth...he kind of just gummed it.  Then, he would let it fall to the tray and mashed it all around.  He pushed all the pieces around, rubbed them on his onesie (don't you love that it's sleeveless?), and even offered the bananas up to us.  The next night - I mashed up half a banana and added some formula and spoon fed it to him.  This went over wayyyyy better than the rice cereal.  At one point he was even opening his mouth up for more. 

 

I think we will stick with purees for awhile.  I'm going to try and make some of my own and supplement also with store bought.  We stocked up on a few 1st food flavors this weekend.

And...we even busted out the high chair too!  He looks pretty adorable in it.  His first food in the high chair was sweet potatoes.  I fed him the first half and daddy took over for a little more. It's safe to say those went over well!

Each time we feed him - he seems to catch on a little bit more and more actually stays in his mouth (the first few trys his tongue pretty much pushed all the food right back out).

Something tells me he'll soon be eating us out of house and home!

 

Sidenote for Max:  If you haven't figured it out yet...your Dad and I are pretty much just winging it. Each day we make decisions that we hope are the right ones...whether it be with food or sleeping...or even diaper sizes!  We're supposed to have it all together and be able to help you navigate through all life's adventures and we will surely do our best - but also we will probably make mistakes. Just know this: our knowledge base is decidedly limited (the memory of us leaving the hospital and Rob going..."they just let us leave...no one stopped us comes to mind) but our love for you is truly beyond measure.