what i'm cooking for my toddler

august turned 15 months old this month. he's officially weaned as of a couple of weeks ago (YAY! what an amazing run that was!) and is gobbling up all the food he can get his hands on. cooking for a baby was pretty overwhelming for me. i had no idea where to start and had no idea what type of approach to take (purées? BLW? pouches?). as with everything related to babies, there were a LOT of loud opinions on baby food. i felt nervous about what to do and felt scared that i was totally going to mess my kid up by accidentally going one way or the other and end up with a child who hates all food.

i did a lot of research (if i'm being honest, most of it was on all the baby food instagram accounts that are actually very helpful!) and slowly began introducing food at 6 months old. as with most parents, we started with avocado. after a lot of research we decided that we didn't want to start with BLW and we'd begin with purées. over last summer we slowly started ramping it up. by the fall, when he turned one, he was eating three meals a day and nursing 4 times a day. it was...a lot of work. we also decided we wanted to focus on feeding him veggies and ease into other things (like meat, dairy, eggs). this meant a lot of steaming and roasting and then blending the veggies since that was his main source of nutrients. when we needed to, we'd add in pouches if we were traveling or hiking or just out and about. but for the everyday at-home meals we tried our best to do homemade meals.

at 12 months old, august was eating:

• avocados 
• squash 
• scrambled eggs
• sweet potatoes 
• prunes
• broccoli 
• carrots
• peas 
• blueberries (diced, obviously) 
• happy baby oats mixed with bananas  
• salmon 
• chicken 

his diet has honestly stayed the same since turning one. we dice a lot more food though -- now that he likes to pick it up with his hands as opposed to being spoon fed his meals. i've introduced cashew yogurt and applegate chicken sausage recently. we also have focused a lot more on making sure his meals are diverse. we'll serve him 3 different foods in one sitting (this was not the case at first). all of them usually have different textures and consistencies. so far, this has helped him not be a picky eater. also, because we aren't doing BLW weaning, we never give him anything off of our plate. which means that when we are eating our own food, he never asks for a bite. 

giving august milk was something that gave me a lot of pause. caleb is dairy free and gluten free, and therefore i also eat a lot less dairy and gluten than the average american. offering august up to 24 ounces of whole cows milk felt ...weird. i'm not the only one who felt this way as i found lots of articles and blog posts about parents offering dairy alternatives for their kiddos. however, after gathering all the info that i've read about cows milk vs all the other alternative milks, i trusted my mama gut and decided to split it 50/50. we give august about 12 ounces of ripple pea milk in the morning and 12 ounces of cow's whole milk from organic valley. i get both of these products from whole foods. august likes it and he's gaining weight appropriately. 

as with most things related to parents, it sometimes feels like we are winging it. will we do all this work if we ever have another baby? i have no idea. but for now, this is what works great for us!

these were accounts on instagram that i personally found very helpful when navigating food:
1. @kids.eat.in.color
2. @feedinglittles
3. @shantripp (she is an RN, not a dietician; but still has a plethora of information

top photo taken from pinterest.