More gruel please

One day, Baby J was watching me eat a cereal bar and started to chew her lip and look expectantly at me. Then, when I walked away to throw away the wrapper, she burst into tears. That was when I decided, my daughter was ready to enter into the world of real food. The operative term here is I decided. It wasn't like the time when against my will and was attempted surreptitiously, she was presented with papaya and ice cream as food choices for a 3 1/2 month old.

So enter into the mysterious world of baby food. There were so many to choose from and this was despite the fact that at 4 1/2 months, not much was available to them. We decided the first thing to try was rice cereal. And even then, it was between white and brown, organic and regular. Choices, choices.

Anyway, armed with a box of each, we decided that Baby J would have a go at it first. After all, she is older (albeit by 2 minutes) and she is better able to sit up compared to her brother. She seemed to have fun with it though there was the requisite mess that came along with it. At points, I wasn't shovlling fast enough for her little mouth and she would demand for more, reach herself forward to shorten the distance between her and the spoon.



Then we decided it was unfair to only feed her and deprive Evan of making a mess. Also, he was watching very forlornly from the wings. It should have occurred to us earlier that he was ready too since this was a bub who had no problems knocking back 170-180 ml of milk.

At first, the lazy boy wanted to be fed in a half reclined position but then realised he wasn't getting the food fast enough and willingly sat up after that. For him, the one scoop I made wasn't filling him so he grumbled while I made more and even then, the boy cleaned off the plate.



At the same time, I tried to trick him with the novelty of the spoon into drinking some water since he's decided water is public enemy Number 1. He did, until the taste of the cereal got washed out off his mouth and off the spoon. Then there was great indignance that I had attempted to trick him that way.

Next, I shall attempt mashed banana.

The only dark cloud is that, this, as with everything else about child rearing is subject to a great amount of interference and thinly veiled suggestions. There are 'suggestions' on what I should feed them, how I should feed them and when I should feed them. No one cares what I want to do. It's more important for them to see me listening to them. I wish I had the guts to defiantly look them in the eye and sing "This is the way I feed my kids, feed my kids feed my kids..." And I'm wise enough not to walk into the trap of saying "But that's what the book says". Like I whined to Tym and put on my Twitter- when they said it took a village to raise a child, they forgot to add that the village would add their two cents worth as well, whether or not it's been asked for.


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