the first supper

mommy announced, over at the daily bebe, that beatrix has begun to try grown-up food. and we've now had three dinners together, each hilarious and exciting in their own way. she's not quite sure what to do with what we're giving her, but the default is to put everything into her mouth, so she's sticking to that. i have to say, the whole process makes me incredibly nervous. the idea is to give her table food and let her experiment with it. the literature says that when they gag/choke you're supposed to let it run it's course. her body is supposed to do this as she gets acclimated to taking the solid food. but when your baby is gagging, eyes bulging, body frozen, it's a little difficult to just stand by and "let it run it's course." seconds feel like days as the gag becomes choking and her mommy and i are looking at each other asking "do we help her now?" cough hack cough gurgh cough- "now?" urk gack sput blurt "okay, that's enough, i'm going in!"

i'm excited to watch her figure this stuff out, and i understand as a parent that one of the hardest things i'll have to do is allow her not only to try new things, but to also allow her to fail and learn from her mistakes, but watching her choke and look at me with those watery big brown eyes... my reaction to this is probably a fraction of what mommy feels when she hears her baby crying- that gut reaction to rush to the rescue- but the sentiment is the same. i'm not so psyched about watching this all take place. it's hard enough to resist the urge to just put everything into her chubby little hands instead of letting her reach to grab things for herself, but i can catch myself "helping" and pull it back a bit. the food thing is a little different. anyway, like good parental paparazzi that we are, the cameras were out in full force. on the menu for tonight- squishy carrots. yum!

some water for a warm-up lap. get those pipes nice and loose...

some water, poured directly into the lap, where it will no doubt be warmed up. meanwhile, the first of the sacrificial carrots is led to the slaughter.

it's all smiles as she lulls the victim into a false sense of security. carrot? what carrot?

do dee do, just looking at my cup...

oh crud. now there are two of them!

this kid is such a procrastinator!

don't fill up on water, bebe. those carrots aren't going anywhere.

finally, she springs into action. what's really funny is how vocal she is once she starts playing with her food. it borders on belligerence. she screams at her food, and not those shrieks of excitement or delight, either. she growls and barks at it, bullying and intimidating it. the alpha male in me, i have to admit, is quite pleased. that's my daughter, it says. the one pounding her tray and shouting baby expletives at those inferior carrots. that's my girl.

since by this point she's doing more playing than eating, daddy gets into the game with a well placed bit of carrot.

this should take her down a notch. i don't want her to be over-confident in her otherwise total domination of these vegetables.

toward the end she displays the punch drunk behavior that any good battle elicits.
still with a commanding hand on those carrots, though. the real fight is never over, bebe. it is within us.

not too messy- and this is after she's thrown-up twice.

here she is, barking orders at her food. "line-up you losers! immunnaeeeachoo!"

or at the very least, drop squishy handfuls of you into my lap.

"c'mon, guys- let's go. everybody overboard!"

"whoa whoa whoa, not you, little fella. you can say hello to my gums!"

"get... in... there..."

"how much of my damn hand do i hafta' eat?"

"ahhh. there we are. down the hatch!"

"alrighty. i've had my one piece, let's get this bib off and hit the showers!"

but first, a high-five from mommy. "good game, good game!"






i skipped out on the second dinner because i was weighing my options between capturing my daughter choking to death versus being ready to save her life at any point, and i went with the latter. that feeding went okay, so the camera was back at my side for last night's dinner, and i'll post those tomorrow. she did a little better with the cup, and expanded her menu to include basmati rice, which she seemed to like...