Greg and I want so much for Alden. We want him to love God, to be happy, to be respectful, to be content, to be loved and to be loving, to be thoughtful and kind, to be successful and driven, to be compassionate and generous, to be a good friend and to be dependable, to be a leader and brave... just to name a few. We have been praying for this little boy before we even knew he was coming and have been working hard since we did to do all we could to give him an advantage. This meant daily prenatal vitamins, healthy organic-when-possible diet, veggies even when my stomach said "NO!", lots of walking, classes and books!, and a long, sober 9 months. We were grateful to have a baby coming and prayed that he would have all the expected body parts attached, and indeed he came out with 10 fingers and 10 toes! We prayed that I would be able to feed him, and I can. And we set our sights on making it 6 months before introducing solid food to him. But it was not to be. And realizing so was a very difficult process for me.
This healthy little boy who is such an enormous blessing to us eats a lot of food (and yes, it shows because everyone proclaims "he's a big __ month old!"). He eats more than I can pump in a day. We were hopeful even still that what I had stored up over maternity leave would hold us out until month 6 but we have come to realize that we would have to re strategize. It was an easy problem-solution for Greg but I agonized over it and attempted all I could think of to try to bump back up to provide for Alden. Ultimately though, I had to come to terms with the fact that we would either need to supplement with formula one bottle a day or move to solid food. Now came a new problem to fret over: which option is best? I think the biggest problem for me was I couldn't, and wouldn't, allow myself to get over the first hurdle - I couldn't make enough milk. But God reminded me that he has been faithful to us and to Alden so far and will not leave us stranded now. I was also reminded that as much as we are able, we do not want to make decisions for Alden based on emotion - and my emotions were definitely crippling my ability to actually make a decision in this situation. So, together, we decided to use this weekend as the weekend to introduce solid food to Alden. And it went mostly as I expected...
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| We decided to start with Avocado, strongly suggested by both of our mothers |
We started with some speculation...
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| Getting ready to take the first bite... |
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| He had some trouble adjusting his sucking instinct to the spoon. |
The I'm-not-sure-about-this face...
Followed by the hey-this-is-good face...
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| By the time Daddy got his turn, Alden had decided that he did like Avocado! |
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| With Alden wanting to help... |
And here he is complaining that we were "All Done"...
Yep, this kid is a bottom-less pit. Already.
