PEAS
Knock knock, who's there, PEAS.
I got a whole spoonful of peas.
Yeah, so the rice cereal didn’t go over well. At all.
Elise would open her mouth for the food, but just give a nasty lemon-sucking face every time she tasted the cereal. Althea would smash her lips together, grimace, and go “NNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!!!!11!!1″ She wouldn’t even accidentally open her mouth for the cereal. I tried different consistencies. No luck. I even tasted it — it was actually pretty sweet since it was mixed with my milk. But neither of them were having it.
So, after five days of failed attempts at rice cereal, we moved on to peas. This made a difference. Elise sits up and opens her mouth obediently. She sucks on the spoon like it’s a nipple and gives a serious look like, “See, I know what I’m doing.”
Althea actually opened her mouth for the peas and took several voluntary bites. She hasn’t cooperated as much as Elise, but it’s promising that she at least eats from the spoon and doesn’t protest. Between the two of them, they pay attention for about a tablespoonful at a time. After that, they both sort of slump over to one side of the highchair, distracted by the patterns in the floor tiles.
This is one of those instances where my gut instinct has to triumph over the books and websites. I’ve gotten great information from this site that I really like, but that BS I’ve read about going through the cereals one at a time for one week at time? With Althea all but laughing in my face, at this rate, I’d be breastfeeding the girls through college (which, believe me, has occurred to me in an attempt to stretch a dollar even further).
So, for those of you who have gone through solids with your kids, what was your experience?
2 comments
My experience is that cereal and all baby food at this stage is just to introduce them to texture and options. Not to really give them any nutritional value or fatten them up or any of that. I think the theory is that if you introduce it now..they won’t freak out after you stop breastfeeding and suddenly switch to food. At the six month or so mark, they’ll get more out of the baby food, before that, meh. Also, Lexi is now 19months..and still eats baby food. I know, she should be eating real food, and she does, kinda, spaghetti, McDonalds chicken nuggets (Shhhh), fish sticks..but other than those, she’s not interested in trying anything new. The moment it goes in it comes right back out. Mashed potatoes, real cooked carrots, real peas, anything…immediately returned to me. I consider all of that proof that whatever you (or I) do, is right. So if they like peas, yay, peas it is. If they hate cereal, pfft, buh bye cereal. So I say good job to you for introducing them to peas and not forcing cereal on them or yourself. Enjoy, new food is fun. Plus, you can try all the fruits and desserts which I can attest are delicious.
Never had success with the cereal…neither kids would eat it. Food, always had success with those. Pick a veg. stick with it for 4-5 days then you can introduce another…just for allergy reasons. You could mix it up right away but if there is an allergy you wont know to what. Once you get through the veggies, start fruits, just so they don’t refuse to eat anything that isnt sweet.
I do make my own babyfood though, so the transition to real food is easier since it actually tastes like that food is supposed to, plus as they get teeth I made it thicker to chew on. With Clara she was eating table food 100% about 8 months old.
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