What do I feed these kids?!

Hello!

I am a new to this forum mom, the boys turned 1 last week. So at our annual appointment, the doc said to get off formula (we still are doing night bfing) and go to cows milk. Well, one boy loves it, the other hates. We have been giving them he 5-6 ounces normally given after each meal and as a snack. We do jars of oatmeal/fruit mix in the morning, with a bottle. Then some puffs or Num Nums as a snack, then lunch a half jar of meat, and a jar of veggies, bottle. Bottle a few hours later. Dinner is cereal with fruit. Night breastfeed, then bed.

I'm just so overhwlmed about how to get them eating finger foods. We do puffs a lot. Some bits of cheese, cut up fruit.

I know a lot of people say they will eat what we eat, but we just don't really eat meals together. We are working on it, but my husband only eats pasta and chicken and fries and potatoes, and I prefer veggie dishes and spicy things, so we need some help! How do you even begin?!

Any advice would be great. I don't want to mess them up with food already!

 

Just wanted to give you a list of some of the things mine were eating at one. My 7 month old has eaten a few of these as well. I figure you can introduce them how you see fit.


Pancakes, waffles, toast and applesauce, scrambled egg, fruit dices, cheerios

Cheese, crackers, shredded chicken, chicken nuggets, buttered noodles, mac and cheese, smashed up meatballs, cooked carrots, green beans, beans, yogurt...

You can even introduce spice in moderation just add your extra spice after you pull a serving for them! Good luck :good:

 

I agree with the above. My kids were eating most of that stuff at one as well and we did supplement with baby cereal and baby food as well. I also gave them cut up grilled cheese too.
As for the milk, we added Carnation Instant Breakfast to it because my two needed the extra calories and it provided some flavoring. You can also try a little bit of strawberry or chocolate syrup to see if some taste might get your DS who doesn't like milk to drink it. If not, he can get his dairy in other ways (yogurt, cottage cheese, other cheeses, pudding, etc.).

 

My husband often eats different meals than we do because his work hours are sometimes wonky. I've made an effort to sit down & eat with the girls so that at least the 3 of us have meals together (they eat what I eat) - when DH is able to join us, he does. Sometimes he'll join us after cooking himself something.

French toast was a big hit here, along with diced fruits, goldfish, graham crackers (well any crackers), cheerios, sweet potato, squash, toast with veggie or fruit purees spread on top & cut into slices.

 

I would say start small. When we first went to "real" foods, I used lots of canned or frozen veggies for convenience. I would say start with some canned veggies - peas are nice and soft, then you try corn, french cut green beans, carrots, etc. Also, try baked potatoes or baked sweet potatoes cut into chunks. Once you get the hang of those veggies, you can try others like steamed squash - I have a small microwave steamer that makes those things quick to prepare.

For meats, we transitioned from purees to "real" meat with the Gerber meat sticks. I cut them into 4 pieces and split a jar between them. Now they can eat most of the meat we eat - chicken, fish, pork, hamburgers, etc. (but I still use meat sticks some because they love them and they are easy to take along if we need to take food somewhere).

For breakfast, my boys are soy intolerant, so I have to make things from scratch, but we do pancakes, muffins, toast (all broken up into pieces), scrambled eggs, etc. And I usually give them some fruit. Lunch is usually a meat of some sort, some veggies (usually canned or microwaved for convenience), and either fruit or yogurt. Afternoon snack is fruit and/or yogurt. Dinner is whatever meat we are eating and veggies I make for them and me (since DH won't eat them). And they have a bedtime snack like crackers, puffs, etc.

It seems like a scary transition, but try one thing at a time and you will get there before you know it.

 

i agree with PPs on inttroducing food. So I am just going to suggest an idea for introducing cow's milk: If one of the babies does not like the taste of cow's milk you could try introducing it slowly by adding it to his formula and slowly replacing the formula until he is drinking only cow's milk. i.e. week 1: 3 parts formula + 1 part milk, week 2: 2 parts formula + 2 parts milk etc. Also watch him closely for allergic reactions because "not liking" a food can also be a healthy warning by the body (one of my LOs is allergic to kiwis and strawberries and luckily refused them again and again when offered until we figured out what was going on).

 

Mine hated milk, too, and we added Ovaltene to it and slowly weaned them off of it.

 

You got some good ideas already. I also want to agree with the transitioning to the milk that was suggested, I did this with all my kids. Also, my ped said a small amt of strawberry or chocolate flavoring in the milk was no big deal, we weren't even using a tablespoon of it, and the benefits of the milk far outweighed the small amt of sugar they got. All my kids will drink milk now, but they do prefer it with flavoring. It's a treat for them now

 

You have gotten a lot of good advice about what to eat, so I will simply reassure you that, YOU WILL NOT MESS THEM UP WITH FOOD. Kids are resilient and there is very little you can do that can't be changed later. You just have to keep trying. And with time, you will get there.

I was (am?) totally overwhelmed by transitining from baby food to real food, too. At first, it seemed that puffs were the only finger food my girls ever got. In fact, at 14 months, we are still a work in progress. The girls still eat Plum Organics traning meals at least once per day. Now we eat a lot of fruit and crackers and are working on meat and potatoes (though non-fruit finger foods mostly get thrown on the floor - I compensate by mashing the potatoes up, dicing up the meat, mixing it together, and spoon feeding them to the girls after at least asking them to try eating the finger food version first).

Some weeks you will be super momma and you will make them two or three good finger food meals. The next week, you will do nothing but "baby" foods. Some weeks you will give them the best finger food meals out there, and they will throw it all on the floor and demand to be spoon fed. That's just the rhythym of life one year olds.

So, keep up the good work, Momma. You'll get there.

 

Great advice! Just keep trying things. We don't eat a lot of meals with our kids either because of schedules so we tend to cook toddler friendly foods just for them. In order to introduce them to more, I have given them some of our leftovers. I found that my "picky" eater actually likes things with more spice! He loves Garam masala seasoning and even ate buffalo chicken off one of my sandwiches!

As for the milk, you may need to experiment with the temperature too. When I first introduced it I warmed it like the bottles but learned that they liked it better cold. Or, if you're giving it cold, try warming it. Also, mine drank it better from sippies than bottles so when we switched to milk we did sippies with meals, nursed morning and night, and ditched the bottles completely.

 

THANK YOU! You mamas made me feel like this is not as impossible as I feared!