Solids and Sleeping and Snakes, Oh My! (Part I)

Now that Joshua is the ripe old age of six months, we are beginning solids ever so slowly. It's an interesting process, honestly, because you really never know what the reaction is going to be. Books and friends all suggest starting with different things. Some people say not to start with fruit because it predisposes babies to only eat sweet things. Others say that it's only the sweet taste buds that are mature at this age anyway, so it doesn't make a difference. And I pretty much am now of the mind that anyone who has an opinion one way or the other has never actually introduced solids to a baby.

Regardless. Being an intellectual type person, I researched and weighed and considered and decided to start with avocado. Now, those of you who aren't dying of laughter right now might appreciate the idea of avocado - after all, it's rich with good fat (great for brain development!) and it's already soft and mushable, so it's very little prep. And, as adults with well developed palates agree, it's quite tasty. Apparently, to Joshua at least, feeding him avocado is akin to letting him know in no uncertain terms that we hate him and would like him to lick wall paper paste. To say he hates it is to understate the situation somewhat.

On the positive side, he had no adverse reaction. So we moved on, because everyone says at this age that eating should be fun and not a struggle and that if something is rejected you just put it away to try again later (and hey, more avocados for me, so it's all good!) And we went with banana.

This little boy can throw down some banana. It was a definite winner. Of course, it's a fruit. And one of the sweetest fruits out there. So. Basically we're just breaking all the rules here. Anyway, we did several days of banana and other than finding it fascinating to see what banana looks like post processing, if you will, there have been no issues.

Yesterday when I was out shopping, I bought some pears and promptly upon arriving home peeled, chopped and cooked them before whirring them up in the food processor. Let me just say that pear sauce is quite tasty, if I do say so myself. Today, since he turned up his nose at my last ditch (for now) effort at avocado (I even mixed in formula...and banana...it's just a big ol' no.) I pulled out a little of the pear.

The boy loves his pears. He was grabbing my hand to bring the spoon to his mouth more quickly and he looked absolutely despondent when his little dish was empty. I'm hopeful that he won't have any reaction to them, because it would stink to not be able to eat something that you clearly love so dearly. We'll see if the trend continues tomorrow.

Hm. Rather than making this a super-long post, I will save the sleeping and snakes for tomorrow - stay tuned!