Eating Update

Baby steps. We're progressing ever so slowly and this does not surprise me one bit. That's been Chloe's style from the beginning. She's always moving forward - you just have to look very closely to notice :-)

This is certainly how it's been with eating. Chloe will eat absolutely anything I offer her. Fruit. Vegetable. Meat. Cheese. Tofu. Bland. Strong Flavors. Spicy. You name it. She'll eat it. That is....as long as it's pureed. I've been trying to offer her new stuff but I've also been kind of lazy about pushing the issue. I figure she'll get there...eventually.

Then a neighbor brought her 5 year old daughter over for a play date with Solana. Her daughter is also vision impaired and will only eat crunchy foods. Nothing mushy. Period. No mac-n-cheese. No mashed potatoes. No grilled cheese. Nothing. She mentioned an online support group that she reads and recently noted several parents with school-age kids who only eat pureed food! Goodness gracious! As much as I love making baby food; I really don't want to be doing it when Chloe's in the 3rd grade! Boy did that light a fire under my bootie!

Here's the good news. Although she's still refusing outright slimy or mushy finger foods (diced banana or pear, for example) she's recently accepted a few foods that had me just about jumping for joy.

-Chopped up pasta with bolognese sauce (I made the bolognese and chopped up the ground beef/pork really small.) This is the first ground meat she's eaten that wasn't pureed! -Scrambled eggs! She fed herself two bites by hand! No gagging or pushing it out with her tongue. She actually chewed (gummed) it up and swallowed! Yippeeee! Then, to top it off, I spoon fed her the rest of the egg mixed up with roasted root vegetable puree. She ate the entire egg! This was a huge deal. I've offered her scrambled eggs several times before. She's never tolerated one little bit.

-Mexican-style chicken and rice.

-She also fed herself a spoonful of peanut butter. (Embarrassing admission - I'd never let her feed herself with the spoon before.)

-Halfway through this entry I stopped for lunch and made Chloe this recipe from a friend's blog. I chopped up some leftover pasta, cooked it in olive oil with some crushed garlic, broke an egg into the mix, scrambled, and finally mixed in a bunch of freshly grated parmasiano reggiano. She actually ate quite a bit! And the cool thing was that there was no "sauce" (ie. pureed vegetable) on it. It took forever and I think her little jaw is unaccustomed to chewing. After 30 minutes I warmed up a cube of pureed ranchero beans and added them to the mix and she finished it off more easily. All of these foods require chewing and she's willing to do it now. This is pretty cool.

Scrambled eggs with pureed root vegetables. Look at how chunky that is! Her faces were cracking me up. These were smiles, by the way. She really was enjoying it. I swear. "Look Mommy! I just ate two bites of scrambled egg!" You can actually see some of it in her mouth :-) (Ignore the filthy bib. This is the ONLY time I've ever put a dirty bib on her. Hehehe)

A peanut allergy's nightmare.

Chloe gets her first taste of Life cereal. She's not shy about diving into Solana's bowl.