Swat that baby down

Last night, I got back late from tutoring, so M-N was elbow-deep in a new sesame chicken recipe when I arrived. (Tangent: It was not bad for a recipe I found in a supermarket flyer. She innovated a bit, adding a much-needed sauce.).

So I fed Little Dude some mangos and snozzleberries and salami (honestly, the food combinations they come up with for the jars of baby food are a bit curious). Then M-N suggested I give him some Cheerios, in our quest to move him onto more solid foods. I've been hesitant about this since the first time we tried and he choked on a Cheerio.

Fortunately, M-N is trained in knitting, yoga, teaching/hand-to-hand combat, and infant CPR. She swooped him up and swatted that Cheerio out. I've taken CPR training twice, but like my training as Batman, I'd rather not have to use it. But I guess he shouldn't be eating only mashed peas with bacon and wood chips until he's 15.

Someone told us to soak the Cheerios in formula. This makes them soggy and less choketastic. You might be thinking that's common sense, but sometimes common sense is hard to find (think: Elvin and Sondra on the Cosby Show).

While M-N soaked and battered and baked the chicken (yeah, I know, you don't bake sesame chicken -- that's probably why this recipe was "healthy" and "less good" -- but that wasn't her idea), I offered Little Dude some soggy Cheerios.He was very eager to pick them up and see how many he could hold and squish in his fists. I tried explaining to him the process of taking in food through the mouth, and how there isn't a pathway from the palm to the stomach, but that just got the blank stare. I eventually started hand-feeding him, and by hand-feeding, I mean putting a Cheerio on my finger, then putting my finger in his mouth, then pulling it back before those two buzzsaws he's sporting lop off my index finger and cut short my guitar playing and astronaut-ambitions.

Long/rambling story short, this was a success, repeated during lunch today (after some Bananas/Scrapple/Paperclips). He even put a few in his mouth on his own. No choking, no CPR, no need to dust off the Batmobile. The boy can learn.