Solid: Part 2

Avocado. If you look carefully, you can see the beginnings of a triumphant grin.

Carrots (and cereal). "If you take away my dinner, I'll punch you!" Squash. This photo was taken in Reno, and the poor girl had had a rather distressing morning. But not so distressing that she couldn't eat, of course.

As Chris dropped off our perfect child at school, her teacher asked, “Has Charlotte tried any other foods besides rice cereal?” “Yup,” Chris answered proudly. “She’s been great about eating other foods.” Her teacher laughed. “Why am I not surprised?” You see, Charlotte has a reputation for being a fantastically enthusiastic, joyful eater. So it’s little surprise that our foray into the world of solids has been quite fun. And messy. Now, a picky eater Charlotte is not. But a skeptical eater? That, my friends, she is. As you know, our girl took to the rice cereal mixed with formula (or “wallpaper paste” as my aunt calls it) with zero problems. Imagine a baby bird opening its mouth wide for Mommy to feed it. That’s what Charlotte looked like. Next, we introduced squash. She took her first spoonful and immediately glared at me, squash oozing out of her mouth. What the hell is this? she seemed to say. Clearly, she wasn’t happy about the change in food. But, ever our Charlotte, she still ate it. She maintained the grumpy look on her face, but she still opened her mouth for more and more. So we considered squash a success. Apparently you’re supposed to wait at least 3 days before introducing any new food in order to rule out food allergies, so this little rule—bogus or not—has motivated us to keep introducing the same food, which has resulted in Charlotte becoming increasing comfortable with it. After Project Squash, we introduced her to . . . carrots! Oh, how this girl loved carrots. She inhaled them. No problem there. The next food we debuted was the avocado. I mashed some up and placed it right on the high-chair tray, thinking she could try eating it with her fingers. Charlotte wanted nothing to do with it. She wouldn’t touch it and she certainly wouldn’t eat it. So I gave her a spoonful of avocado, but she scrunched up her face and immediately spit it out. When I offered her another bite, she turned her head away. Uh-oh. Charlotte doesn’t like avocado, I realized. Refusing to force the issue, I switched to the rice cereal and fed her that for awhile. Then I snuck in small bits of avocado into the rice cereal, but I swear, Charlotte was just like a dog who can eat an entire bowl of dog food, snarfing right around the pill you hid in it. This girl detected the tiny pieces of avocado stuck in her lumpy spoonfuls of rice cereal, and then spit them right out. On Day 2 of Project Avocado, I mashed up the food again, this time adding water to thin the consistency. This sort of helped. She took a couple bites but then turned her head away again. I gave her some cereal, and then returned to the avocado. This time, as I gave her the spoon, my little control freak started grabbing at it. Why not let her feed herself? I reasoned. Maybe if she feels like she’s in control, she’ll better accept the avocado. It worked! Charlotte had a blast trying to put spoonfuls of avocado into her mouth. It wasn’t pretty, but pretty wasn’t the point. (I’m still finding traces of avocado in that area of the kitchen.) By Day 3, Charlotte was eating avocado like it was carrots. More, more, more! she wanted. She’s now a major avocado fan, so it looks like guacamole is in our future after all. I’m having the best time watching Charlotte discover new tastes and textures. Even if she initially rejects a food, finding out how to get her to warm up to it gives us new insights into her personality and the things that make her tick. She never ceases to crack us up with her own special brand of Charlotte goofiness, impress us with each little development, or make us simply beam with pride as she sleeps peacefully with her mouth hanging wide open. Last night as Chris fed her the solids, Charlotte paused eating and stared at her daddy with a totally straight face. Then, out of nowhere, she erupted into a loud honking laugh. That’s our girl!