The 6th Month Baby Milestone

My baby girl is 6 months old today! Half a year old!

My husband and I were just remarking that we can't believe how quickly we've come to this milestone of starting solids. It took forever with my son to reach it. Especially since he had reflux and needed to be on medication and everyone kept telling us the reflux will get better once he's older and starts taking solids. The first six months crawled by for us with him. And now in a blink of an eye, our baby girl's ready to eat!

We've been thinking about what her first food should be. It feels like such a big moment, the first time she will ever experience taste in a whole new way. And texture too. And all kinds of wonderful things. For me, the power of taste, together with olfaction, bring me back to memories of home-cooked food, of happy care-free days growing up in my family. 

We gave our son avocado as his first food. It's supposed to be an excellent first food because of its creaminess and texture, and it's a good fat food that can aid in a baby's brain and physical development. I remember he was all excited to see this green mash on a spoon making a beeline for his mouth, and he was so eager to taste it.

I thought we could give our baby girl the same first food but my husband is quite adamant that she's a different baby and she should get her own first food which she can rightly claim as her own. So we've decided on sweet potato for her. Which is a pretty orange and yummy to boot, so I figured we can't go wrong.

She's been very interested in watching us eat, she always stares at us with really keen eyes when we're having dinner. And when she manages to catch our gaze, she'll give a really big grin like - hey, how about throwing me some of that?

We got her all ready for lunch today, and got the camera and video ready to capture the moment. And once my son realized what we were doing, of course he wanted to be the one to feed her, which he did, but then he shoved the spoon too deep into her mouth and she started to gag and choke and...well, it wasn't pretty.  We have it on video and this will no doubt be priceless for the kids to watch when they're older. 

My good-natured baby though seemed none the worse for wear once she had recovered from the brotherly force-feeding love, and she was game to have more sweet potato. She expertly rolled it around her mouth and even looked like she was chewing. And so we're off to an excellent start with solids for our little baby girl.

And she's growing up all too fast!