Ketchup and Lies

I suppose it was bound to happen sooner or later, but it still seems like it came out of nowhere. One day, they were eating almost everything I put in front of them. The next day, everything required ketchup.

Their future.

And I do mean EVERYTHING.

Roasted chicken? "Ketchup?" No big deal.

Cauliflower? "More ketchup!" I can handle this.

Beef stew? "No! Want ketchup!" Excuse me while Mommy suppresses the urge to vom under the table.

Some sliced grapes? "Ketchup, mommy!" My stomach literally turned at this one, a real-life horror straight out of the book If I Could Keep You Little by Marianne Richmond, which mentions finding out "you like ketchup with your grapes." Who knew it was a real thing? And can we never do that again, please?

I wouldn't mind so much if they weren't starting to scoop the ketchup straight into their mouths, bypassing the nutritious food entirely. We've now taken to dribbling the ketchup on top of the food to ensure they eat something other than lycopene and sodium for dinner.

And yesterday on the way to daycare I caught Periwinkle offering her stuffed bunny "More ketchup, Bunny?" Adorable, right?

On a related note, I'm now lying to my children with regularity. They will eat pasta only if you assure them that the red sauce on top is ketchup. Also, all meat is known as "chicken" because that is all Periwinkle "likes." Don't tell her she's recently had salmon, beef, pork, and ham, if you'd be so kind. I'm not sure she could handle the shock.

What do you mean this isn't ketchup?

And they now refer to spaghetti as "pizza" and meatballs as "robots." Indigo requesting "More bobots, mommy?" is perhaps the cutest thing in the world. I claim no part in these mistakes -- they are all them.

However, Periwinkle referring to a stuffed lion as her "binosaur" is definitely my fault. Their recent obsession with dinosaurs has led to some serious tiffs over Indigo's red dino he got for his first birthday, and which is suddenly THE toy after a year of being ignored. So the lion has an identity crisis now.

Don't judge me.

Food at Daycare

Inevitably, 10pm rolls around and I realize I need to pack food for daycare. I always have a stash of pouches on hand, but I like to use those sparingly, preferring to put together my own menu for them. But in a pinch, pouches rule. I've used Target's Up and Up brand, as well as Ella's Kitchen and Plum Organics.

But seeing as we're trying to do less purees and more textured food, a la Baby Led Weaning, I don't use them often. I've begun encouraging the daycare workers not to mush the food up completely and spoon feed, but rather to just put it in front of the babies and let them try to figure it out. They do really well with Cheerios so I know they can do it, plus I've seen them tear into a banana and a piece of hamburger without issue. Unfortunately I don't think daycare is quite ready to give them big chunks of food, so little chunks or mashed food it is.

Indigo gets upset because he just wants the food in his belly, and can't always grasp it, so they usually end up spoon feeding him in the end. But Periwinkle gets her hands dirty and has fun with it. That's my girl!

So today I sent a little bowl with half a scrambled egg and a cut up strawberry, for each of them. They might need to be fed the strawberries as they are little slippery pieces, but I know they can mash them up just fine with their gums so they should be okay once they get them in their mouths. And the egg was in big enough pieces they should be able to pick them up. I'll see when I pick them up how they did... I was pretty proud of that little breakfast menu so I hope it was a success! I've never sent those items before, so it'd be nice to have this new option available in the future!

I also microwaved a sweet potato (a fairly small one) and mashed it up a bit (but not too much). They each got half a potato. I also sauteed some baby spinach (baby spinach for babies!) in some EVOO. What started out as two cups of spinach got reduced to about 1/4c. sauteed spinach each. I mixed that in with the potatoes, and I'm hoping they just grab it all with their hands and get nice and messy trying to eat it.

A lot of my twin mom friends say their babies are only drinking 24oz. of formula/breastmilk these days. Mine still drink 30-32oz. Fatties? I doubt it. I think they just aren't being forcefed three pureed meals a day so they are still relying on formula for their nutrition, which is as it should be right now. They are trying new foods, learning how to use their hands to feed themselves, and not necessarily filling up on solids. Which is the whole point of BLW. Food is fun until one!

Any other suggestions on fun foods I can send to daycare? Stuff that is easily mashable by little toothless (or nearly toothless) mouths but that they can still feed themselves?

The Little Things Thursdays: Week 1

Inspired by Rebecca of A Beautiful Ruckus, I'm going to try to start posting about the little things each week that bring me happiness. So often it's not the big events in life that add up to feeling happy (although vacations to Europe and winning the lottery would be welcomed if you're offering), but the small things. When I was younger, I used to absolutely love running out to get the mail. Heck, it's still an exciting part of my day, especially when I actually get real mail. Sadly, no mail for us today. I checked four times. Each time, so full of hope and anticipation!

So, in that spirit, here are five little things that made me happy this week.

#1. Indigo smiling more often. I can't get over how much his face changes and just how happy he looks. When he's happy, I'm happy. Unfortunately, I haven't been able to capture this smile on "film" yet, so no photo of this little thing.

#2. Feeling healthy. I've been doing Jillian Michaels' 30 Day Shred, and as much as it hurts, it feels great! I missed feeling active, instead of just a blob of pregnant lady. We'll see if it's helping when I weigh in at Weight Watchers on Saturday. I've also been eating better and tracking everything again. Just knowing I have to input it into my phone makes me think twice. In fact, I discovered a great new meal at Chili's: Margarita Chicken! I need to learn how to make it at home!

Not sure I'll end up looking this good, but I'll take what I can get!

#3 People telling me how cute my kids are. I think they are, but it's nice to have that validated by other people.

We went for a walk yesterday, and they were actually awake for once!

#4 Hot showers. Need I say more?

#5 New recipes. Always good to mix things up! We've tried a few from Our Life in the Kitchen, a blog I'm going to need to follow more closely, methinks! Tonight I made Pork and Rigatoni with Onions. I wasn't sure as I was making it, but it turned out amazing and is definitely being added to our roster of meals to choose from. Next time I will probably reduce the butter to make it a bit healthier, and I didn't put cheese on it, as Blue doesn't like cheese (I know, I know, weirdo). Here's a picture of the version on the blog:

ourlifeinthekitchen.com

Feel free to share your little things in the comments!

A fun side note: Baby farts sound really funny when they are in the Ergo.