She's on Strike

Tali's been on a spoon strike since Sunday and is refusing to let a spoon get anywhere near her mouth. She does one of three things (or sometimes all three at once) when I bring a spoon to her mouth: turns her head away, seals her mouth shut, cries. After two days of this I did a bit of reading to see if it was normal and, luckily, it is. This is Tali's way of asserting her independence and it normally happens between 8-10 months (she wasted no time - one week into her eighth month). The strange part is, her mind is ahead of her body/skills on this one because she's not really ready for finger foods. The signs that she's ready include: crawling (nope), pulling herself up (nope), using her jaw to mash food (not strong enough yet but she tries) and has mastered the pincer grasp (sometimes, but not always). Despite not showing any of the signs that she's ready to move on, she is.

So for the past three days all of her meals have been finger foods. She's had banana, avocado, mango, cooked apples and pears, bread, etc. - all cut into small pieces. Today I am going to be brave and let her spoon feed herself. This will be messy - Jackson will love it. I am also going to make some turkey meatballs (full of veggie purees as a substitute for eggs) so that she can get some protein. And, I'll start her on shredded cheese. I'm on the fence about giving her tofu. There's both good and bad information about soy for babies and I have not yet decided what is best for her. The more I think about it, the more I come up with foods to make for her. This won't be so bad. In fact, it might be easier than pureeing food. It's definitely more fun.