Squash - My New Hero

Starting on solid foods wasn't as smooth as I had expected. I didn't expect to go home after talking to the doctor, serve Mason a full meal, and then have him sleep 12 hours that night. I may have secretly hoped for it, but didn't expect it. 


That first week we tried brown rice cereal. Gag. Sweet potatoes. Gag and heave. Peas. Gag. Rice cereal mixed in breast milk. Gag. Formula mixed in breast milk. Gag and heave. He wouldn't eat anything and I was devastated.


Finally, we got him to drink a bottle of breast milk with a little brown rice cereal mixed in. We kept adding more until it was barely thin enough to make it through the nipple. That was it for a couple weeks. 


After he got used to the rice, I went to the store and bought a few different kinds of baby food to see if Mason would eat anything else. I know it can take up to ten offerings before they like a certain type of food. I also figured I would stop trying to mash my own food for now since I've heard some babies do better with the thinner, smoother texture of store baby food.


Here's Mason eating peas. Mmm, "nature's candy" as Damen always jokes. Apparently Grandma loves peas, but he and Kade never did. This is the most common look I get when I try to feed Mason. Peas, no. Bananas, no. Sweet potatoes, no. Carrots, no.

Fortunately we gave squash a try. This is currently the only food Mason will eat without making a face. He loves it! We have only been feeding him squash for just over a week now, and he will eat a 4 oz jar in one sitting. He often makes noises, and it sounds like he is saying "Mmm" the whole time he eats. (Butternut squash was the food I hated most as a kid, go figure.)

Each of the past few nights he has had one stretch of sleep lasting four hours. Hopefully this trend continues. I love you squash!

Tractor Beam

I've been working on photos for this post for awhile now, but this is as close as I could get. Mason has started noticing his hands, and sucking on his fingers. He'll suck on any individual finger, or as many as he can fit into his mouth. It seems like every time I turn around he is eating his fingers or shoving something into his mouth. Kade described his mouth as a tractor beam...it just draws everything in. So here we have a few examples...

The two-finger suck. This used to be his preferred method, but it is dwindling. He also sucks on just his ring finger, and sometimes his thumb, but that involves having an open hand with the rest of his fingers poking him in the eye. I could never get a photo any of those.

The inadvertent finger-in-the-nose finger sucking...

Grabbing my hands to eat them or whatever I'm holding.

The double-hand shove...his current preferred method.

The grab-anything-near-me-and-shove-it-in-despite-how-it-tastes trick. This is a Happy Birthday Grandma sign I was trying to take his picture with.

Ah, and finally my favorite...sucking on the toes. I generally find him like this a couple times a day. 

Now I am trying to get him to keep FOOD in his mouth. We'll blog about that later.

Trick or Treat

I played in the Halloween Hat tournament last Saturday. Mason and I went as Little Bo Peep and a sheep. The costume idea came from Toy Story. Damen had to work or I would have dressed him as Woody. It was a fun day playing ultimate, and Mason seemed to like being outside. His furry costume kept him nice and warm during the chilly morning. I had a good time getting out and running around this weekend. I paid for it in sore muscles and exhaustion, but it was worth it. (My mom was kind enough to watch Mason for a few hours Monday while I slept...that helped!)


Here we are Saturday morning in our costumes.

Here is Mason on Halloween. I made Damen take his picture along with our carved pumpkins. I don't think Mason loved his costume, but I sure did! 

 He got tired of our picture taking quickly enough...

And like good parents we laughed and kept taking photos before rescuing him. Happy Halloween!