For his Christmas Dinner, our Bernard had his first proper go at finger food, in the form of a french bean with all the lovely red wine gravy licked off by mummy. French beans prove to be a good size and shape for small graspy baby-fists [even reknownedly monstrous ones like Bernard's], and can be sucked flat before being flung to the floor ready for the next one. Rah!
Since then we have had a few florets of broccoli dipped in butternut squash puree, which seemed to be enjoyed, although not much was actually eaten. This morning he had some mango slivers to accompany his mango puree, which made breakfast much more successful, and we appear to have finally found a fruit that he likes. An expensive one. Of course.
Lunch today was steamed carrot sticks, which were thoroughly mangled before being flung; but some must have been swallowed, because lo! there it was in the nappy. Nice. And today at teatime he had a dried apple ring for pudding. Which daddy keeps having to go and rinse in water from the kettle – are we taking too literally the advice that we no longer need to sterilise after six months?
At this stage finger food doesn’t provide a proper meal, because he doesn’t swallow much of it; but in combination with a nice variety of purees I think we will do very well, thank you. We have leapt straight into lunches and puddings, as you can see, but since we are cutting down the morning and lunchtime breastfeeds now, it’s important that he has other sources of fillage and nourishmentary. The best bit is, when he likes a food, he grabs the spoon and shoves it into his mouth. We then have a little tussle with it so that Pete or I can take it back and reload it.
He isn’t drinking a lot – refuses formula and has only a few sips of water from his cup, with meals – but makes up for it whenever he’s allowed near a boob. He is whinier than usual at the moment, and it’s harder to get him to nap because he is hungry in the mornings, and I can no longer nurse him to sleep. But it will start to resolve itself soon, I’m sure of it. Any son of mine should quickly figure out how eating works.