As I shared on Monday, the decision to start feeding Jacob “real food” has been a bittersweet experience for me. After a failed experiment with rice cereal, we moved onto fruits and veggies. Since we started out with sweet potatoes, his first feeding should have been an all-sweet experience for him, but from some of the looks on his face you would never have known it.
The problem with Jacob’s taste buds is that they have yet to discern between food and non-food objects. In fact, he seems to have his wires crossed on the issue. If you were to divide everything in the world into “food” and “non-food,” his food category would include the bars of his crib (see Exhibit A below), stuffed animals, fingers, and me. Also, I’m quite sure electrical cords would be high up on his list of delicacies. Apparently, the more danger posed by an object, the more delicious it tastes to a baby. Same goes for plastic content—the more the merrier.
This, I am guessing, is why he didn’t love vegetables right off the bat. They’re too innocuous, except maybe when being used in a food fight. And, they don’t contain a high enough plastic-to-vegetable ratio, except when being served in hospitals and school cafeterias.
Anyway, it really didn’t matter that much what he thought about sweet potatoes during his first feeding, because I’m quite sure that more ended up on him, us, and every object within a 10-foot radius than ended up in his mouth. Still, I can’t remember the last time I had that much fun. Tom and I had a blast watching his funny faces and seeing him learning to make decisions, pushing and pulling the spoon away.
It was so much fun that we decided to move onto avocados. (I know you’re only supposed to test one food at a time for the sake of food allergies, but I was over eager.) They were a huge, though messy, hit.
During our first couple of feedings, J-cub was pushing out more food than he was swallowing, but it wasn’t long before he was a pro.
Now, if he could only learn that electrical cords aren’t an actual food group…
