Munchkin Meals

As I mentioned last week, the host of Munchkin Meals, Brittany over at A Healthy Slice of Life, has decided to move the link-up to an every-other-week format, so the next "Munchkin Meals" will appear on August 23rd.

Liam is about 8.5 months old. He sits unassisted, gets into a sitting position from lying down, crawls on his belly and gets onto his hands and knees (but doesn't crawl with his belly off the ground — yet). He is learning to be a good little brother, and started sharing his meals with the dog.

I've pretty much stopped pureeing food for him. We're finishing up the fruit purees we have left at breakfast, and lunch and/or dinner are finger foods, typically a baby-friendly version of whatever we're having for dinner. Liam vastly prefers feeding himself to being spoon-fed. He's still working on getting the food from his hands to his mouth. I think more ends up in his lap than in his mouth. But he's happy.

I'm essentially a stay-at-home mom (I spend a few hours a week doing graphic design for a chain of physical therapy clinics, which I complete while Liam naps or after he has gone to bed for the night). On a typical day, Liam gets 3 meals, and nurses 6 times. On days we run errands, we skip lunch, and on days that he's teething, he won't eat anything that's not crunchy, like Mumm Mumms, graham crackers, Cheerios, or Plum Organics Puffs.

On this particular day, Liam's breakfast was two ounces of pear-banana puree with a tablespoonful of iron-fortified organic oatmeal.

I recently introduced kiwi for the first time. The face Liam made when he tasted it was priceless, but not captured on camera. He refused to eat any more that first day. I thought offering it with pieces of a milder-flavored fruit he already likes would help, so lunch was half of a banana and half of a kiwi.

Yeah, not so much. He ate the banana, but not the kiwi.

Dinner was rotini pasta with Bolognese. I was able to offer some of our dinner to Liam without much alteration. The Bolognese contains ground beef, onion, garlic, tomatoes, oregano, and basil. I don't add salt when I'm cooking dishes that we will share with Liam; The Mister and I add it to our plates at the table. Liam ate about an ounce of pasta and a heaping tablespoonful of meat sauce.

Dessert, not photographed, was about a dozen organic blueberries, cut into quarters.

Please head over to the host blog, A Healthy Slice of Life, to see more Munchkin Meals!