Day 141 - Using your hands

Today's Tip - Let your baby use his hands to explore feeding time with solid foods and a bottle

Now that your son is probably grabbing for everything in sight, he's going to want to go after anything you bring near him, and that includes bottles and solid foods. While your initial reaction might be to keep things clean and easy by not letting him, you should be letting him go for it. Sure, you'll have to deal with a little mess. Some cereal in the hair or some spilled milk, but its nothing to cry over. (Sorry for the cliche'd analogy...I have no excuse).

If your baby is having trouble eating, it might not be because of the food, it might be because he doesn't like having a spoon shoved in his mouth. My son eats pretty well, but some days he just doesn't want to have a spoon in his mouth. He'll sit in his high chair, happy as can be, and then every time I try to give him some food he gets all bunched up and fussy.

Plus, letting them experiment with putting food items in their mouth will help them get the hang of feeding themselves. I don't really want to be spoon feeding my son when he's 22...it'll be bad enough when he's living in my basement playing video games all summer while eating all our groceries. Some things never change I guess.

Parenting, Feeding, Development, Hands