Yes please!

Mommy or Daddy coming home from work is undoubtedly one of Olivia's favourite moments.  But honestly I think this might be her second favourite, number one being...(drum roll please)...EATING TIME!

As she is carried into the dining room with an already set table, her eyes and mouth open wide with excitement and anticipation. At this point, she starts making all kinds of sounds,and her legs usually start kicking uncontrollably, making it very hard to fit her into the high-chair.  Sometimes she even starts drooling!  Then, as we give her meal, she dives in…and believe me, she knows how to enjoy her food!  I would not blame anyone who witnessed this and thought we starve the poor girl.

This has been Olivia's attitude toward food pretty much since the very first meal she had other than breast milk. Good thing, else we might have falsely believed that it's a result of our good parenting  and culinary skills…although I would still like to claim that it has something to do with my amazing kitchen skills! Some people have asked me for tips on how to get their little ones to similarly eat, but honestly there's not much that I have done to "get" Olivia to eat. We just decided from the onset that we would keep a very chilled attitude about introducing solids, at least for the first year of her life. We see it this way, that food is just for fun, learning and exploring for now, and hence we offer her most of the foods that we eat as a family in pieces that she can handle and manipulate (all of this within reason, of course we do not feed her McDonalds and Coke!). We know that when she feels like eating, she will eat, and without much effort from us. And when she's not interested in a meal that I've prepared for her (which is very rare), that's okay too, it just means she doesn't feel like eating at that moment. And her main source of nourishment continues to be breast milk for now.

I don't give this information as advice, rather I just want to share the approach we have taken with Olivia. Who knows, it may not be the same with our next one. But for Olivia, this was the best decision we made in terms of food.

I think this little girl is a living, breathing example of the quote by Luciano Pavarroti: "One of the very nicest things about life is the way we must regularly stop what we are doing and devote our attention to eating."

Oops, I must end this now, it’s feeding time again…on the menu today, a large, fuzzy, succulent peach…let the eager kicking begin!

Bread roll attack! She wasn't actually eating it, just ripping it apart. - A few days before turning 6 months

Licking her bib after eating papaya for the first time at 6 months. 

Feeding herself oatmeal. Just over 6 months old

We love eating with her at the table

Steamed carrots. I love that expression!

"Thank you mama :-)"

So focused! :-)

All time favorite- PEACH!

French toast. "Yummmy"

"This spoon business is not fast enough!"

Another favorite- Avocado on rice cake

All she did was to squish it!

"Hmmmm, I'm not too sure about this meal mama, but I'll try it."

"Can I pleaaaase have some more berries"