A little while ago, I wrote a post about Getting My One-Year-Old to Eat. There I listed a bunch of different strategies I use that help get my little one to eat, as well as a bunch of ideas for what I’ve had success feeding her. If feeding your little one is as tricky as it is for us, I suggest you take a look at that post for more ideas.
Here I would like to share with you a few things that have helped get some sustenance into my (newly) toddler. Delicious, nutritious and well-received, hopefully these ideas will help you fill up your little one, too.
Self-Feeding with a Spoon
Getting my bean to open her mouth for incoming scoops of nourishment isn’t the easiest thing to do. What I’ve found that has been hugely successful in regards to this is to let my babe hold the spoon, then I help her to scoop up a bite from her dish and she happily will put it in her own mouth. I believe it’s the change from the scenario being about my acting upon her to her own efforts to act for herself that make her much, much more interested in eating off a spoon. When I feel that enough food has made it’s way into her, I’ll let her play around herself trying to scoop and transfer the food from the bowl to her mouth.
Pomegranate
I recently tried pomegranate with my babe, and she loves it! Packed full of vitamins and antioxidants, the little gems of pomegranate are easy for little ones to pick up and feed themselves. Forewarning, it does stain, but so long as you prepare with taking off any clothing you want to keep in it’s original state, or arm with bibbery, you’re good to go.
I have been using this method for opening up the fruit and getting the little bits out.
–
Cottage Cheese with Fruit
When I originally tried cottage cheese as a source for calcium and healthy fats for my growing babe, she was not that into it. My little one doesn’t seem to have much of a taste for cheese.
I’d recently had a deliciously healthy dessert when visiting a friend, made of crackers topped with cottage cheese and candied papaya, so I decided to give the dessert a shot at our house, with some alterations. Instead of candied papaya, I used canned pears in fruit juice. Fresh fruit would have been an even healthier choice, but this was nice and easy and we had a can in the pantry waiting to be used, so out it came.
I gave my little bean her crackers separately, and put the pears and cottage cheese in a bowl. Using the self-feeding spoon method I wrote about above, I was amazed to see my little one eat not only her entire bowl, but a second as well. Success!
Hopefully these little tips come in handy for others looking for ideas around getting their babes to eat more healthy food. Good luck!!