Food!

A local (non-local?) mommy group that I belong to is doing a Blog Hop....and this will be our first post of the hop....
I suck at keeping up my blog so hopefully this will give me the push I need to blog regularly.

This weeks topic: What is your child's favorite and least favorite foods? Are you Happy about it? What do you do to promote a diverse palate?

Ahhhhh food.
I love it. Mike loves it. Livi....well, not so much. Well I guess I could take the blame for her being so picky, since I am myself, but I won't. :) But boy-oh-boy is she! When we first started table foods, she was a freakin vacuum! Anything and everything went into her mouth, no care in the world if it was edible, clean, covered with dog hair. ::barf:: So when she started to ask for certain things, I was ecstatic! This little tiny person is actually expressing an interest in what she is shoveling into her face....I must oblige right? And from there it's just been a steady, downhill slope. And one that Mike and I just cannot agree on...or even really see eye-to-eye a lot of the time. See, I grew up a little, eh, spoiled, when it comes to eating. If Mom was making spaghetti, and I wanted chicken, she made spaghetti for the fam, and chicken for me. And if my sister wanted burgers, well, we had spaghetti, chicken, and burgers on the table that night. And we never had to finish. Clean plate?? What was that? I loved dinners in our house. :) Now Mike on the other hand, wow it was different. What was cooked was what was had....if you didn't like it, you had the choice of either just eating it to fill your stomach, or you just didn't eat that night. So needless to say, he is not picky at all. But I regress....

Livi.

So as she grew, she started "hating" certain foods. Ok, she "hates" all food that isn't mac and cheese, or cheese pizza. And the kid never got into condiments like other young people these days...Ketchup? Too spicy. Ranch? Yuck! Jelly? Icky. And the list could go on. And poor pepperoni...poor, poor pepperoni. She hates it. Like will.not.eat it at.all. How can you not like pepperoni?? And everything is "too spicy" Wha?! I eat hot sauce like it's going out of style, and Mike is close behind me. I'll make those raemen noodle packets with Franks red hot instead of water for goodness sake, and my child hates spice.

Her favs? Well, I think they fall in line with every other kids favorite foods....mac & cheese, cheese pizza, broccoli. Probably in that order too. Although she really does love perch. Really any kind of fish though, and steak. The girl loves her some steak! Now you can't put anything at all on the steak, except for salt, but still, she'll eat it up.

I think she's fine being picky. Afterall, I was, and I turned out fine. She doesn't need to eat exotic foods if she doesn't want to. Heck I never had my first hot dog until a few years ago and I survived. Mike's view? She needs to eat what we're having. To end this constant debate, and to have more peaceful meals, we've devised a equilibrium over this.....every meal Livi has to try it. She has to take 2 mouthfuls of whatever we are having, and make her decision. If she truly doesn't like it, fine, she doesn't have to eat it. And if she does like it, well, I guess you know the outcome of that one then.... And she's honestly liked more then she hasn't. So it's been good. I have no problem with what she eats, and doesn't eat. I'm not going to freak out because she didn't eat as much today as she did yesterday, I'm not like that.

Now should I include the V'ers?

I suppose her fav is the soy formula that she sucks down constantly, lol. We've started baby food, but honestly, she's not really into it. But she's my stinky soy girl. She would never breastfeed so I had to start pumping...and did that for 4 months before I went insane with it. I hated it. H.A.T.E.D. Now I know a lot of people get all up in arms because I didn't breastfeed my child, or because I started her on formula by choice, etc. And you know what? It's sad that I had to feel bad about stopping, because they look down upon you if you *gasp* formula feed your child. Blow me. We went to formula and we were all happier. Well, I guess to be honest, once we switched to soy formula we were all happier. ;) She didn't tolerate the regular stuff well, and had issues, but once we switched, it made a world of difference.

Oh, and babies do not like meat. Particularly when they are 4 months old and the meat of choice is pieces of turkey. This is what happens when a Nana gets a hold of such a creature and the face that followed....