Toddler Nutrition

My DD is a great eater, she loves all the food groups (right now LOL) so I am very lucky but I was still worried, new mom syndrom I think. So I asked my dr. this and he was not good at the answer. he said w/ a toddler you should look at the whole week and see if they are eating from diff. food groups. he said that since they go through times where they are too picky you will make yourself crazy trying to fill in the food groups. But.....I liked to look on http://www.mypyramid.gov/ to find info, you can create a plan to suit your child w/ their age and weight.

Try not to think of a per-day view or toddler eating, but more like a per-week view. It will make things much easier.

Another way to do it is if you only have healthy things available to eat, well then, you're set.

I don't know how old your child is but this is what I've found 12-18 months they eat everything you put in front of them. 18 months-2.5 (at least) the eat nothing. 2.5ish--?? they eat a bit more but are still picky and can occassionally be adventurous.

Heather is right...for toddlers it's about getting the food pyramid in a week, not a day. If you look at what your child is eating over the course of 7 days, I would bet that they are probably doing okay. My daughter rarely ate meat until only recently (she's almost 3) and survived solely on carbs and veggies, and I use the term 'veggies' very loosely! If your child is growing and hitting milestones, I wouldn't worry. Keep offering them the good stuff and eventually they'll eat something!

As many as they're willing to eat!

We always have fresh fruits and veggies in the house. Our kids (2 and 4) LOVE the small salad cucumbers from Costco and will snack on them whenever possible along with celery, grapes, blueberries, cantaloupe, etc. Bananas and pears are often another staple snack in our house.

There's always a fruit or vegetable with dinner. Sometimes it's frozen (cooked) mixed vegetables or edamame, mostly it's broccoli, carrots. Last night was a mini cucumber, celery with peanut butter, and strawberries/blueberries.

I sent a huge bag of grapes, strawberries and blueberries to Day Care this morning for them to have with their snack since they usually don't have fresh items there.

I'd say they get at least 3-4/day on average.

2-3 on the fruits, 0-1 on the veggies. I buy her the gerber graduates meals (she's almost 3) and besides corn and carrots, it's the only meal that she'll eat with veggies in it. I try to buy the V-8 splash stuff with veggies in it to sort of make up for it. She's so picky! I also give her a multi-vitamin a day.