Off To A Good Start

Most of us have pretty early risers. Many kids like to get up at 5:00! But now with the new time change, yeah! 5 is now 6. Much better. If your child is like mine they're pretty hungry when they get up. So chances are they are not going to be very patient waiting for Breakfast.
I have a few quick standards that Ben loves, and I can feel good about:

- Yogurt mixed with applesauce and cereal- So this one started when he was pretty young, which is why we still use baby cereal. Most yogurt is loaded with sugar, and the milk has it's own sugars on top of that. So I prefer to buy the Plain Cream Top (with the fat) kind. Kids need their fats, so stay away from low-fat yogurt. I add Organic Unsweetened Applesauce to the yogurt, to taste (regular applesauce adds sugar you don't need). It's usually about 1 part to 1 part, but you could add a little more or little less of either. Then I add just enough oatmeal baby cereal to thicken it up a bit; otherwise it's pretty runny and difficult to feed to your child. I've been thinking lately Wheat Germ might work just as well as the baby cereal, and I think it has Omega 3's in it. I'll have to look into that. Of course you could add any additional fruit to this as well. I keep a bag of organic frozen blueberries in the freezer; they are easy to thaw and add to about anything. Also canned peaches packed in pear juice (not syrup) and pretty covieniant and tasty.

- Cottage cheese with fruit- that's about it. Just get low- sodium, full fat cottage cheese if you can. And watch the large chunks if you have a younger baby, you may need to chop it up a bit. Peaches, blueberries, pears, any fruit will do. Cottage cheese has tons of protein, and all the vitamins milk has.

- Blueberry Pancakes- can be made a head of time and frozen, which makes then very easy. I bought a whole grain organic pancake mix, and added some of the frozen organic blueberries I keep on hand. Ben devours them, and I know they're much healthier than white flour pancakes. I don't bother with syrup (which I can imagine makes a real mess). Besides, Ben doesn't know pancakes usually come with syrup, so he's pretty happy just with the pancakes. They are an easy finger food, too. This morning I spread a little applesauce between two pancakes, like a sandwich, before I cut it up. Worked pretty well.

-Oatmeal with raisins and cinnamon- I buy the old fashioned kind of oatmeal in a tube. Hannaford's makes an organic variety that is very reasonable. You just microwave the oatmeal and water for a couple of minutes (according to directions on box). Be careful, when I microwave it for the full time suggested the oatmeal usually rises up and spills everywhere- so many sticky messes I've cleaned up! Oatmeal is usually cooked fine in less time. Then I just add a handful of raisins (chop them up first if your child is younger) or dried apricots, etc. Add some cinnamon, then top it with a little whole milk. Easy, healthy, and he loves it. Just a note about dried fruit, I try to buy organic, and unsulfered. Not sure why unsulfered is healther, but I think it's considered a preservative. Maybe someone out there knows why?

- scrambled eggs are easy to make a head of time, I don't freeze them, I just make enough for a couple of days. You can top with a little cheese, too. I've experimented with adding herbs to the eggs too. Some success, some not. I've tried herbs de provence, and italian seasoning. I guess I'm just trying to expand Ben's pallette a little.

More breakfast ideas tomorrow. Have a great day.

Introduction

     We all know Americans are getting fatter.   I've had my own life long struggles with weight.   And as a new mother, I want to not only feed my child healthy meals now, but I want to establish habits that will last a life time.    I want to give my son the the best start I can, so that hopefully he will have a positive relationship with food for life.  They say their taste preferences are set early, and I see this time as an opportunity to help mould those preferences.

      My son is now 14 months old.   Ben is a typical toddler.   He's growing more and more picky about food.  And capricious! One day he loves broccoli, but the next day turns his nose up at it.   I'm finding I have to get very creative and resourceful to make sure Ben gets his well rounded healthy meals.    

     From talking with other mothers, I know we all are trying to find creative and new, ways to keep our babies healthy.   I decided to start this blog to share my discoveries; my successes and failures.   I hope this will help other mothers with the same goals for their children.   If only one mother gets their child to eat one green vegetable because of something I've posted, then I all of my blogging has been for good cause! :-)

      I will try to share recipes where I can, but because of copyright laws I may not always be able to publish something.  But I will always try to direct you to the cookbook or website, if possible. 

      I'm going to start blogging about feeding my 14 month old, but at some point I would also like to share some of what I learned from feeding him from 6-12 months, what I can remember.   

      I'm hoping too, this will be a forum for other mothers to post and share their successes and failures.  And hopefully we can all learn from each other.