Serving Sizes For Table Food

Good morning! :wavey:

I'm still over on the FY board, but I need your expertise. My babies are on 3 8oz bottles a day and table food. We'll be done with bottles in about 4 weeks.

My question is this, how do I find out how much they should be eating? I want to be sure that they are getting enough, but not too much either. I wonder things like: is 1/2 a waffle enough? how much cheese? is 1/2 a banana enough?

Right now I pretty much split things in 1/2 and let them eat what they want and I'm not worried because they still get formula.

Where can I find this info?

Thanks!

 

I bascially just feed mine until they stop eating. At 11 months mine were on 3 bottles a day (6 oz. each). They got a morning bottle and then breakfast 30 min. later. For breakfast it was oatmeal mixed with a fruit (they each got a whole thing of fruit with oatmeal mixed in) and split a pancake or toast and some times both.

They did not get a lunch bottle, but would get a grilled cheese split ( now they each eat a whole grilled cheese) or 4 chicken nuggets between them. I always, and still do, give them each a yogurt. They may also split a banana, or some dried fruit. I just keep feeding them until they seem full and start throwing their food on the floor or putting it in their seat.

They got a 3:45 bottle at that age.

Then dinner was basically whatever we were eating. Again just feeding until they were full.

Then they got a bedtime bottle at 7:30, this is the only bottle they still get.

I'm not sure there are any set guidelines on how much to feed, plus all babies are different and need different amounts.

I just feed until they are full. But at that age since they were still getting formula that was filling to them too.

 

Oops, sorry, double post.

 

Mine have had a pretty wide range of "normal" meal sizes depending on how active they are in a given day, how they're feeling, whether we're eating at home or out, their age, etc. There are some guides online that give you a rough idea of how many calories they need each day but it really does vary. What I do now is to prepare about the same amount of food they ate the last time and then give them something else if they eat it all (or they eat everything but one particular food and still seem hungry). They will pick and play when they're full and letting them have the control has worked -- they stick pretty close to their growth curve.

 

I obsessed about this at first, but then bought a book that defines the serving sizes for 1-3 year olds as follows:

meat, poultry, fish - 1-2 tbsp
eggs - 1/4 of an egg
cooked, dried beans - 1-2 tbsp
pasta, rice, potatoes - 1-2 tbsp
bread - 1/4 slice
veggies - 1-2 tbsp
fruit - 1-2 tbsp, or 1/4 piece
milk - 1/4 to 1/3 cup
fats & oils - to appetite

When looking at serving sizes in this perspective, my girls eat plenty. They will split 1-2 containers of yogurt for breakfast, plus split a piece of toast and eat Cheerios. For lunch they often split a grillled cheese, or split one of those mini plastic containers of leftovers from our dinner the night before. And for dinner they eat what we eat. I just let them keep eating until they are done and start playing with stuff.

Oh, and we do 2 snacks now, always a protein source (usually cheese), fruit, and a cracker/graham cracker.

 

I don't think there are rules about "enough" and "too much," there are just averages. Some toddlers eat a ton and others hardly eat anything -- most fluctuate between those two extremes. The important thing is to offer food at regular times, offer a healthy variety, and let them eat until they are full. (Sometimes this is hard to tell -- mine will say "All done!" several times, while still eating -- or they will insist they're still eating, but they're really just playing with the food.) As a PP said, I just plan for them to eat roughly as much as they ate last time they had whatever food I'm serving, then I always offer some kind of a backup (crackers, yogurt, cheese) -- something they almost always eat -- so that they can have that if they're still hungry but really don't like whatever else I'm offering.

 

[SIZE=10pt]I agree with pp about being lax about "enough". I would highly recommend Ellyn Satter's book Child of Mine. There is a chapter on feeding your toddler (12-36 mos) that was very helpful for me in moving out of the mindset of reaching a certain quota for the day. Her big thing is the division of responsibility:

You decide when and what they eat, but they decide if & how much to eat. It takes the power struggle out of eating, which cuts down on mealtime drama.

I have really enjoyed meals with the boys (food & sippy cup throwing aside ) since reading this book and getting a better picture of the wide spectrum of normal for toddler eating. [/SIZE]