M is a very small (12th percentile) little person. We have been encouraging her to eat more high protein and naturally high fat foods (read: we aren’t filling her with junk, but rather things like whole milk ricotta, avocados, cottage cheese and her favorite food- beans). She is actually a wonderful eater, her list of accepted foods is much larger than any toddler I have known. I attribute this to two things, a. the true lack of junk food in the house (minus dad’s cereal cabinet and mom’s persistant cravings for pizza and ice cream drumsticks) and b. that she was offered a large selection of organic homemade baby foods. I cooked (and mashed and mixed and strained) all M’s first foods myself (yes, we had jars for quick and hurried meals) and her current diet has maintained all the quality of those early meals. Teaching M to eat means much more to me than spoons and forks; good eating manners, knowledge of where food comes from, how to prepare it and how to make healthy decisions about the content of her meals is paramount.
