House mystery
Baby-led weaning isn't as easy as it's touted to be, at least for us. While Maya seems super excited about eating everything (which is great!), she really can't hold on to a lot of food with her hands. She either squeezes the bejesus out of the food item, rendering it to mush (banana sticks are a prime example), or they fly out of her grasp from too much juice (e.g., mango pieces). Some things (like brussels sprouts) are just the absolute wrong shape and size to promote adequate ingestion. And then things like yogurt? Yeah, right.
This means that we mash up a bunch of our food and feed it to her by hand. Sometimes we pre-load spoons for her, but this is an exhausting process of picking said spoons up off the floor and picking the cat hair off of them. So for the purists, I guess we're not actually doing baby-led weaning.
However, the one, single food that Maya can consistently feed to herself (and has since day 1 of solids) is asparagus. So, we eat an obscene amount of it. Mostly, the asparagus spears end up on the floor, but as evidenced by her diaper, she does actually consume a fair amount of it as well.
We began having a problem with it sometime last week. Maya has occasionally shoved an entire spear into her mouth at one time (after gumming it to an extremely flexible state), and then I have to go fish it out. But last week during a dinner, we looked up and suddenly…every single asparagus spear we'd given her was suddenly GONE.
Me (checks the floor, finds it empty): "Honey, where'd all her asparagus go?"
Husband: "Did you check her mouth?"
Me: "Yes, there's nothing in there. But I looked at her just a bit ago, she had a whole spear. There is no way she ate it all."
Husband: "OK, well if it's not in her hand, then it's in her lap or on the floor."
(Both of us do a thorough search, come up empty.)
Husband: "Oh god, she must have eaten a whole spear!"
Me: "No way. There is no way. Besides, where are the others? I gave her like three."
Husband: "Oh GOD. She ate THEM ALL."
Me: "No, I'm sure I heard at least one spear hit the ground. The cat must have eaten them."
(Everyone looks at Abby. She looks angelic.)
Husband: "No way. Cats don't eat asparagus, are you crazy? Maya must have eaten them, in which case they're all stuck somewhere inside her. Should we call the doctor?"
Me: "No, I'm telling you, there's no way she ate them. It was Abby."
(Repeat entire scenario again later in the week. Maybe twice? Anyway, finally….)
Husband: "OK, I'm sure I'm right. I'm putting a spear in Abby's dish, she'll never eat it."
Me: "OK, but you have to walk away and pretend you're not watching her. Sneaky ninja cat HATES when people watch her eat."
(3 minutes later)
Husband: "No way, she ate it!"
Me: "Quick, Google to make sure asparagus isn't poisonous to cats."
(Nope, just causes diarrhea if given in large quantities. Great.)
And thus we have a (very fat) cat who thinks she's a dog.
And here are some more photos of our week:
This means that we mash up a bunch of our food and feed it to her by hand. Sometimes we pre-load spoons for her, but this is an exhausting process of picking said spoons up off the floor and picking the cat hair off of them. So for the purists, I guess we're not actually doing baby-led weaning.
However, the one, single food that Maya can consistently feed to herself (and has since day 1 of solids) is asparagus. So, we eat an obscene amount of it. Mostly, the asparagus spears end up on the floor, but as evidenced by her diaper, she does actually consume a fair amount of it as well.
We began having a problem with it sometime last week. Maya has occasionally shoved an entire spear into her mouth at one time (after gumming it to an extremely flexible state), and then I have to go fish it out. But last week during a dinner, we looked up and suddenly…every single asparagus spear we'd given her was suddenly GONE.
Me (checks the floor, finds it empty): "Honey, where'd all her asparagus go?"
Husband: "Did you check her mouth?"
Me: "Yes, there's nothing in there. But I looked at her just a bit ago, she had a whole spear. There is no way she ate it all."
Husband: "OK, well if it's not in her hand, then it's in her lap or on the floor."
(Both of us do a thorough search, come up empty.)
Husband: "Oh god, she must have eaten a whole spear!"
Me: "No way. There is no way. Besides, where are the others? I gave her like three."
Husband: "Oh GOD. She ate THEM ALL."
Me: "No, I'm sure I heard at least one spear hit the ground. The cat must have eaten them."
(Everyone looks at Abby. She looks angelic.)
Husband: "No way. Cats don't eat asparagus, are you crazy? Maya must have eaten them, in which case they're all stuck somewhere inside her. Should we call the doctor?"
Me: "No, I'm telling you, there's no way she ate them. It was Abby."
(Repeat entire scenario again later in the week. Maybe twice? Anyway, finally….)
Husband: "OK, I'm sure I'm right. I'm putting a spear in Abby's dish, she'll never eat it."
Me: "OK, but you have to walk away and pretend you're not watching her. Sneaky ninja cat HATES when people watch her eat."
(3 minutes later)
Husband: "No way, she ate it!"
Me: "Quick, Google to make sure asparagus isn't poisonous to cats."
(Nope, just causes diarrhea if given in large quantities. Great.)
And thus we have a (very fat) cat who thinks she's a dog.
And here are some more photos of our week:
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| Baby boo tries on a new swimsuit! She's soooo big! |
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| We race to refill the "mesh bag of ice" teether every time it gets low. |
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| Tooth progress! |
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| Can you see both of them? |
Maya is looking so pretty! You can see the little girl that she's turning into. I was wondering how BLW was going for you guys. I guess we're doing a version, too. As in, he feeds himself almost exclusively (we need a cat like Abby! There is currently some kind of compost pile on the mat under his chair), but we pretty much mince everything first. I couldn't handle the stress of watching him gag!
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