The Bottomless Pit

How much food is a seven month old baby supposed to eat, anyway?

Dr. Ranney has always assured me that Jonathan, while chunky, is just fine. I don't need to worry about him being too fat. It's one of the benefits of breastfeeding. However, at our last visit, we discussed starting solids. She said, quite diplomatically, "Just two meals a day will be fine for him." I suspect the unvoiced part of that line went something like "or he'll be the size of a Yugo before the first grade."

So far, Jonathan has tried rice, carrots, peas, sweet potatoes, oatmeal and peaches. We're holding off on further sweet potatoes for now, but everything else has been Hoovered down. Three weeks into feeding and I no longer need to make funny faces and wait for a smile before I slip a little taste into his mouth. Now, Jonathan gapes open as soon as the spoon comes into view. We serve up the food straight from the fridge - it makes no difference. Everything, except rice cereal, is met with a smile. I can't tell if he has any preferences.

More importantly, I have no idea how he acts when he's full. I just run out of food, and I'm scared to add any more. For lunch today, we started with two tablespoons of oatmeal and two of peas. Yummy! It was gone in five minutes. I offered a tablespoon of peaches. Nice! Then I mixed together some carrots and rice cereal for a bit thicker texture. Great idea! Then we had some more oatmeal. The mouth keeps popping open any time a spoon is near. Jonathan thinks this is just fantastic. I'm sure he'd tuck in to nurse if I offered.

Dear readers, may I suggest you all buy stock in Gerber? I think their sales will be going up.