Expanding Appetites

The boys are really getting into finger foods (other than puffs) lately.  I'm happy about this because I think they were getting addicted to puffs - going through a container of these in less than a week, which isn't that great because as our pediatrician told us, they're just puffed up air and not really nutritious.  But I've figured out that the fascination has become more with being able to feed themselves now, and it doesn't matter too much what the food is.  So we've been giving them pieces of fresh banana or blueberries along with their morning oatmeal, pieces of cheese with their lunch baby food jars, and for dinner (this is the fun one where I try to mix it up a bit) they've had tortilla pieces with avocado, peas, broccoli bites, mixed veggies, and edamame beans.  Surprisingly, they didn't like the pasta I offered the other night.  Here they are eating some peas when this concept was a little newer.

Owen is still a little more picky about what he eats.  When I first put out a selection of peas and broccoli, he tried the broccoli once and spit it out, then specifically skipped over all those pieces and ate only the peas.  He even resorts to taking his choice foods from Oliver's tray, who doesn't seem to mind.

One last feeding feat has been getting them to hold their own bottles, a skill that will become quite valuable (for us) once the new baby arrives.  Oliver became a pro at this pretty quickly, and while we've seen Owen do it a few times, he prefers to sit back, relax, and have someone hold the bottle for him still, especially when he first wakes up and at bedtime.