Foodie Baby: 8 months

My good friend Brittany hosts Munchkin Meals once a month and it is such a wonderful opportunity for me to catch up on what baby has been eating.  Check out Eleanor at eight months.  Quite the foodie baby!

This baby loves food.  Have we mentioned that lately?  Meal times just get more and more fun each and every day.  She eats more food and we are constantly surprised when she gives us her "all done" signal and there is no more food to be found on her tray, high chair, and even on her!  She gobbles it all down.

This month we found ourselves cooking less "baby-specific" foods and feeding her simply what was on our plate.  Last night's dinner for example: tofu and mushroom kabobs with grilled summer vegetables, cucumber salad and fresh garden tomatoes.  We ate ours with BBQ sauce but she went plain all the way.

I served Eleanor a tomato slice, a whole kabob (minus the stick), cucumbers and a few slices of grilled squash.  The remnants:

There were a few strands of mushroom and squash lurking on the floor and one smooshed piece of tofu in her chair.  The rest was history.

Eleanor has a good grasp on her pincers and has been able to pick up small items like blueberries, cheerios and green peas since she was around seven months old.  Nowadays I never worry if the food we feed her is too small or too big.  She is able to bite off pieces and roll it around in her mouth until it is just right for swallowing.  I can't remember the last time I heard her cough while eating.  She has really learned the art of eating.

For breakfast Eleanor polished off a Blueberry Buckwheat Bake.  I have a love-hate relationship when it comes to feeding Eleanor blueberries.  Such a mess, but so much fun!

I broke the muffin into three large chunks and let her go at it.  She mushed it in her hands and in her mouth, and when her tray was clear I would pick up the remnants from her chair and legs and replace.

She would once again eat and mush until her tray was clear again.  Repeat, repeat, repeat until all that was left was this:

We have been doing a little bit of baby sign language with Eleanor and every now and again we can get her to signal "all done."  This morning she looked right at Alex, said all done (sign language) and started pushing her tray as if to push it away.

She is so incredibly smart, funny, cute and amazing!  I love this girl!  And I seriously love watching her eat.  It is so entertaining.

That is some lip-smacking good food! In just the last few days we have introduced a sippy cup at meal times too.  She loves chewing on it, but hasn't really grasped the concept.  She would much rather sip straight from our cups, but then she just spits all back out at us.

At eight months Eleanor eats three times a day and nurses four times a day.  Of course every day is different.  If we are out of the house or it's not convenient she won't always get breakfast, lunch and dinner.  And we are ok with that.  She is a go-with-the-flow baby which works really well for us.