constipated?

try the prunes!!

chicken tikka masala

we took the kids for indian food a few weeks ago, and it was a hit! joe and i both love indian food, so we thought we'd introduce the kids to it. greta was a bit more hesitant than otto, but she loved dipping her naan bread in the tikka masala that we ordered for them. and otto chowed down. we probably should have left a bigger tip for the mess that the waitress had to clean up. he was going to town!....the only thing he didn't care for were the peas in the rice, which were few and far between. he still insisted on picking each and every one out of the rice. yum!

cupcakes

otto eats

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our boy otto loves his food. don't get me wrong, he is definitely more of a discerning eater than greta was at this age. when she was around a year, she would eat anything. tofu, spinach by the handful, you name it. otto, not so much. but what he does like is feeding himself. table foods mostly. he will use a spoon every so often, but he definitely doesn't have that skill mastered and he definitely thinks it's funny to watch you squirm as he puts the spoon on his head or bangs it on the table...anywhere but in his mouth.
and trying to feed him food from a spoon....forget about it. every once in a while you can slip a bite or two in while he is trying to pick up a bite of something. but where greta was fine to let you spoonfeed her while she picked up table foods at the same time, otto is quick to this idea. he hurries the food to his mouth, waves his arms in front of his face, or turns his head to refuse the spoon. unless it's cottage cheese. then all bets are off.
we can't wait to see where he weighs in at his one year checkup here in a few weeks. just this morning he ate two waffles for breakfast. the same size breakfast that i ate.

no pets

growing up, we could always count on our dog, smokey, to pick up any table scraps. looks like in our household, otto is our trusty companion. here he is, crawling all the way under the table and over both of those iron bars for a tiny piece of cereal.

icing

mama may or may not have been caught eating icing right out of the can. and greta may or may not have asked for a bite. did i give her a bite of chocolate icing? i'll never tell.....

monkey see monkey do

greta had a banana (and part of a pear) for snack the other day, and otto decided he'd like a bite. actually, he decided he'd like half a banana. then, while they were eating, the "ba-na-nas" song from greta and otto's best of 2009 cd starting playing. greta thought the whole event was hilarious, and keeps trying to recreate it at snacktime. ("mama, let's have bananas and pears and otto can eat too and we can listen to bananas song").

carrots

as if saturday wasn't a busy enough day, otto followed it up by having his first food (besides rice cereal) on sunday. his first bite of carrots was a bit hesitant, but then he really seemed to like them. he gets pretty vocal if you aren't feeding him fast enough, grunting and whining, throwing his hands all around. and when the food is gone, he is not a very happy camper. we'll stick to carrots for a few days and then move on to something else exciting....squash perhaps??!!

rice cereal mess

i remember reading in some parenting book to let your baby "explore" with their food, getting familiar with the texture by putting some on the tray, in their hand, etc. with greta, i thought this sounded not only ridiculous, but also like a huge mess. with otto....oh well, what's the big deal about a mess? i guess we'll see how i feel when the mess is carrots or peas.....

rice mushies

did you know that otto ate rice cereal for the first time? and that he was very excited?
check out the two videos below to see him in all his eating glory. he was all smiley and excited, waving his hands around and trying to grab the spoon. guess it lived up to his expectations.

makin' bacon

yep....that's a piggy in a frying pan. placed on the couch by greta. she does love bacon.

five guys

so now that greta has no allergies that we know of, we had a celebratory dinner of Five Guys Burgers and Fries. greta loves fries...and apparently loves cheeseburgers. here she is with all that remained of her cheeseburger. she ate almost the entire thing. you can sort of see the food coma setting in.....

toast is good

i'm strong to the finish....

....cuz i eat my spinach. (and love it).

time to make the donuts

greta and i headed to the natural foods store to pick up some ingredients to make christmas cookies (more on that in another post). while we were there, we picked up a egg-free, dairy-free donut. essentially, a donut that greta can eat!! even though she looks perplexed in this picture, the donut was a hit. joe was afraid to try it, but i tried it and it tasted just like a regular donut (i swear).

i love "real" food

greta has been eating more and more real food these days. bits and pieces of what we are eating for dinner (versus something that was pureed by either me or some baby food company). she loves it. here she is eating pieces of the beef barley soup i made. emphasis on the beef. this girl is no vegetarian.....

Feeding Time

Greta doesn't much like to have other people feed her anymore, and prefers to take matters into her own hands.... She's been doing this for a while, but here's a video...

what's for dinner?!

here is a picture of greta smiling during mealtime.

lately, greta and table food have not really been best buds. and she is pretty good at making her feelings known. this means that when it is a food she doesn't like or when she is finished eating, she puts her hands in front of her face. or she turns her head away. or she grunts and growls. or she arches her back in her chair. or all of the above.

we've been trying to figure out why greta doesn't really want to eat that much anymore. could be that she doesn't really care for the texture of some of the food i have been making. (although i like to think this isn't the cause.) she's also been sick with a cold, and her two top, front teeth are coming in.

the other thing happening right now in the eating world is the greta MUCH prefers to feed herself. so, we've been trying to offer finger foods as much as possible, while sneaking a bite or two off of the spoon. i've also bought some jarred baby food and that seems to be going a bit better than my homemade version (darn). the past few nights have been better food wise. tonight, greta ate some sort of turkey/rice concoction (nasty) and some sweet corn casserole (nastier) from the spoon. she also fed herself some cheerios and bits of a plum. and the smile in the picture was the end result. hurray!

do you like my carrot mustache?

Puff Daddy

Greta loves her sweet potato puffs. These little A shaped delicacies are also a great learning tool for figuring out how to pick something up and eat it.

Just a couple days ago she literally had no clue, but tonight she did one at a time for about 15 in a row. Making the same growling noise when trying to pick it up, and then the same chatty/chewing noise as she gets it in her mouth.

Fun times....