Solids for Infants

You should try to introduce him to lunch meat so he can have a sandwich cut in quarters to hold for himself and he can eat with a spoon now so try Spegehtti Os or little Raviolis. He just needs to be able to feed himself.

That's not very much milk (formula)! Will he take an 8 oz bottle?

It looks like he may just not be hungry. Eating every 2 hours is more of an newborn/infant schedule than a baby/toddler schedule. At this age he should be eating more like every 4 hours. Try cutting out the morning bottle and going straight for breakfast (with maybe a couple of ounces of formula in a cup with a straw). Keep the small bottles before nap and bedtime to help him sleep, but make his meals more 'real' food. It may take him a little while to get used to it, but he will and rest assured babies don't starve themselves. :o) Just continue to offer a variety of foods and he'll be fine.

Just a phase - don't panic or stress. If he realizes that you are stressed about food/eating, he will use it to push your buttons. Stay calm and act as if his eating is no big deal. For 11 months old, he is doing great. Let him eat what he wants and keep introducing new foods.

Dear S.,
Try sharing things from your plate with him.
Things like scrambled egg, little bits of chicken, fish, steamed squash, mashed potatoes and gravy....
I realized early on that my kids didn't like jarred baby food because it was too bland. The only thing they liked were the carrots and the plums. They wouldn't touch the other stuff.
And, for whatever reason, kids think what's on mommy's plate always tastes better anyway, so offer him some of what you're having. I let my kids taste everything. Just keep trying.

Best of wishes!

I have a 12 month old. I would suggest moving the 6am bottle tile after he eats. He is probably not hungry because of the bottle in the morning. I tried and tried to have the bottle when he wakes up too, but he wasn't hungry.. He still isn't a big breakfast eater.. more into lunch..but he eats.
here is my son's scheduled:
6:00 wake up
6:30 breakfast
8:45 8oz bottle before nap
when he wakes up offer water and small snack food like cheerios..
12:00- lunch
2:30- 8oz bottle before nap
when he wakes up small snack again
5:45 dinner
7:15 8 oz bottle before nap

I know I am giving him alot of milk..the doctor said it should be 16 oz only. but I am not ready to change his schedule.

I would just suggest to look at the bottles you give him before breakfast and lunch to see if you can change those somehow...

Offer him a variety..but don't force anything.

You say you've tried sitting with him as he eats. Have you tried having him sit with you? In other words, do you ever just have him sit at the table with everyone else in the family and serve him most of what you're all eating? Of course when you serve him what you eat, you'll need to cut it up in smaller pieces, but at 11 months of age, most of what you eat should be something he can try. Sometimes all it takes is to put it in front of a child and allow him to observe others eating it in order for him to get the idea.
Your schedule looks pretty good, but I would consider starting him with the family meals and schedule snacks around those times. The rule of thumb is to offer a toddler a snack or meal approximately every two hours, which appears to be what you are doing now. Make sure he isn't filling up on the crackers, etc. at snacks so he'll be more ready to eat other foods. I usually offer a piece of fresh fruit or vegetable with a few crackers, or other grain food and a cup of milk, water or juice at every snack.

I personally recommend introducing a child this age to a regular cup or glass rather than a sippy cup. They learn to drink well very fast. You will need to hold the cup for him for the first several months, but gradually give him more and more control over it, and by the time he's fifteen months or so old, he'll likely be handling it most of the time on his own. For times when you want him to be able to drink without you being totally present, get one of the type of cups with the straw rather than a sippy. Those are much better for his mouth (dentists recommend them over the sippy) and also less prone to spilling. I only use the straw cups for water, because I feel it's just too difficult to be sure other drinks are thoroughly cleaned out of them. For milk and juice, we always use a regular cup or glass. (By the way, we've gone almost completely away from plastics, so use glass or ceramic cups. It works, but you do have to be with the child when they are using them.) I should also mention that we don't use high chairs. Most people do, and my recommendation is to bring the high chair as close to the family table as possible. If the child can handle it, leave the tray off the high chair and just put the chair up to the table so the child feels like part of the family.

Also, be sure he is getting in enough good outdoor exercise. If he's walking, be sure to take him outside for good periods of running around. Nothing gets up an appetite faster than running around in the fresh air. Even if he's not walking, get him outside to play. Put a blanket on the ground if necessary. Make sure you have shade to protect him from too much direct sun, but let him get the fresh air.

I had this very same issue with my little girl who is now 16 months. She was never a great eater but sometime around this time she turned into an incredibly picky eater. My ped said it was very normal, so first of all, breathe!

Our issue was teeth. I didnt' realize with this child how much her mouth hurting affected her eating habits. She was just so incredibly cranky nothing was desirable. Again, the dr. said it was normal.

Here are some of the tricks I used.

Mac n cheese: my daughter too loves Kraft mac n cheese so I used the "Sneaky Chef" tactics. I leave out the butter and stir in butternut squash puree. I SWEAR you cannot taste it! Then I slowly sneak in small veggies into the mix until she notices. I have gotten away with frozen peas and veggies and even on occasion canned tuna fish for protein. After a long time of not eating much more than crackers my daughter ate THREE baby bowls of this concoction for dinner that night!!!! Tofu is also a good one to mix in since it has little flavor. Use the silken variety if you want it to blend in well. Then, hey, let the baby eat mac n cheese all day long if need be!

Yogurt is FABULOUS so dont' worry about that. Just try to mix in healthy stuff in small bits--- pumpkin, fruit--- and the same with the oatmeal. On its own its a healthy food so dont' worry. Mix in small amounts of fruit at a time.

Good luck!

As a family child care provider, we are to have children on the menu plan for children at age 1 year. A meal and a snack are two hours apart and a meal and a meal or three hours apart. It seems to me that your little guy is eating too often. If he was hungry I would think he would try more foods. Also if he eats what the other kids do, he would try more foods. I cut everything up in tiny teeny pieces and serve it on a plastic plate and give him a spoon. I give a child this age a tippee cup of milk for breakfast and lunch and snack. After he has been feeding him/herself for awhile, I will help them to eat but they usually like to be independent. If they are hungry, they will eat. We buy and cook the food. We serve the food.
The kids can eat a little or alot or nothing at all. That is the shared responsibility of meal time by the State of California. We serve a wide variety of home cooked meals.
As babies I buy stage 1 but then at stage 2 make my own with a brawn blender, later I mash the food, then little pieces of whatever all the other kids are eating too. We want meal time to be happy so don't stress. Around the first birthday the rate of growing goes down.
F.

This is completely a phase. My son is inconsistent in this way still. he is 11 mos. old and I still nurse him. One week he'll do fine with foods, the following week he will eat only certain foods and only wants to feed himself. What I have tried is mincing or slicing veggies/fruit and put it into his cereal. so, maybe you can do the same with his oatmeal and yogurt. For veggies, you can dice some broccoli or green beans, etc. and put them in the mac and cheese. I think it can also be a texture thing. One week my son will eat chopped apples in his cereal and some days he won't. As long as he is giving out enough wet diapers, etc, he should be fine. And, if it helps, his growth is fine as well, lenght, etc Though his doctor requested a weight check in a month. However, he has been teething (getting 3 teeth at once) so the doctor knows this could be part of his inconsistency. Hope this helps. I've had to do the "sneaking in veggies/fruits" with all 4 of my kids at one point or another.

Good luck!

You've had some great advice so far! I wanted to add two suggestions. If he's only eating yogurt, mac 'n cheese and oatmeal, buy the very best, wholesome brands of these foods you can afford. Go for organic whole grain and organic whole milk plain yogurt. I also second another Mom's strategy of sneaking as many veggies into these foods as you can (I think I saw a can of pureed butternut squash at trader joe's today)
A recipe book for children/toddlers that I love is "The Petit Appetit" by Lisa Barnes. I used this all through my daughter's early solid phases and still make some of the delicious recipes now that she is 2 and a half.
It will change! Good luck.
A.

Keep trying!!!! Sometimes it can be just a phase they're going through, and sometimes it can be just their personality. He's getting to the place where you have to start seeing his bottle as a supplement rather than his meal. That can be a difficult transition for parents watching the number of ounces consumed go down dramatically. I would work on trying to sneak some foods into some of his favorites, I know that adding pureed veggies such as squash, cauliflower, carrots, and any other similarly colored veggies to a favorite like mac and cheese, can alter the vitamins without changing the color and taste. There are a few cookbooks out there sneaking fruits and veggies into meals. Keep offering the new foods, I read somewhere that it can take up to 17 times for a child to develop a taste for foods.
As for the bottle, my advice as you make the transition to milk is to only offer it in a cup (if getting rid of the bottle is important to you). Kids learn that their favorites are served in a certain way, and changing that on them can cause a strike. For some kids, changing from formula to milk is an adjustment in itself, so changing from the bottle to the cup seems natural since you're also changing what's being offered, setting up a new expectation.

And finally, realizing that every child is different. My daughter was happy to have her morning milk any which way she could so transitioning to a sippy cup was no problem. My son went on strike when I tried the same method and went for about a week drinking very little, so I gave in. He was off his bottle by 15 months and we haven't looked back. Keep in close contact with your ped, they can help you monitor his progress and weight and refer you to eating specialists as needed. All in all, it sounds like you're on the right track by modeling appropriate eating behaviors and offering child sized, finger friendly foods. Keep it up!!

Hope this helps!

~K.

most babies and toddlers go through frequent phases of refusing to eat new or unknown foods. my son is going through a major "no veggie" phase, but he used to LOVE veggies.

that being said, keep offering the new foods. if he wants to feed you, i think that is fine. seeing you eat them will signal to him that you like them and that the food is good and yummy.

a few things you can try: mix fruit (pureed or small chunks) into the yogurt. you can get plain or vanilla yogurt and and have a small container of fresh fruit or jarred baby foods to mix in the yogurt. while the food might be "disguised" a bit, it will get him used to different flavors. you can do the same thing with the oatmeal.

you can also add chunks of veggies into the baby food jars. if you show him that you're mixing in the foods, he'll know that there is a new food and not be completely tricked.

kids are very sensitive to new things, but it does not mean they cannot or will not adapt. just keep offering the new foods. it takes a while and a lot of patience.

about the weight, unless your son's pediatrician is voicing concerns over the weight, i wouldn't fret so much.

80th percentile does not mean that he is *better* than 80% of kids. depending on the length of the child, it might not even be good.

consider this: these days they are saying 1 of every 3 kids is overweight or obese. kids over the 50th percentile for weight can very well be overweight, depending on their height. as kids start walking and approaching toddlerhood, weight can fluctuate more as muscles start to tone and the burn more calories with the extra activity.

if the ped isn't super worried, i wouldn't worry.

You've had wonderful suggestions so far. Yes, it takes a while to expose them to different foods that they will like. It is frustrating to give babies something that you know that they will eat and all of a suddent they refuse it. I've been there. So have many moms out there.

One thing I suggest is since he is 11 months old, remove the morning bottle until after he eats breakfast. Maybe he only needs it before going to sleep? Second, he doesn't need to eat every 1-2 hours. Start spreading out snacks and meals every 3 hours or so. While it seems that you need to feed him more often since he's lost some weight, he can be more picky since he's not hungry and more food will be coming shortly. Third, is your son crawling and cruising? Is he very active? Kids can drop percentiles if they are very active. Last, if you have baby cereal still yet, mix it with his baby food and whole milk yogurt. You could also mix baby food or purees into other things that he eats, like squash or sweet potato in his mac and cheese. Good luck!

totally normal for children to go through this phase - they're becoming more independent in all sorts of areas and wanting to do more things "by myself" instead of just letting mom or dad do it. Keep offering a variety of healthy things even though he refuses - he'll come around on his own time.

I found Nutritionist Ellyn Satter's book "Child of Mine, Feeding With Love and Good Sense" to be really helpful and informative in the areas of encouraging healthy eating habits and understanding how a child's developmental stage affects the way they approach their food.

Hi S. B,

It sounds like he may be a little tactile defensive. That is a big word that means he doesn't like new textures or tastes and is being stubborn. My suggestion is two-fold.

1. Get some pediasure at the grocery store and start giving him that in his sippy cup or bottle. That will get him the nutrients he needs immediately and keep his weight up.

2. Go to your doctor and get a referal to a nutritionist (insurance should pay for it with a referal) and get some tips on getting him to eat other foods. He may need some occupational therapy to get him to tolerate new textures and tastes.

Don't let this scare you. Lots of kids have this problem but a nutritionist will be able to help him (and you) get past it without a lot of drama.

T.

Our ped. said it could take 25 exposures before my daughter might try a new food. Keep putting it out there and just make sure there are lots of options. When hungy, they will eat.

s