Today the girls and I went out to lunch with my moms’ group. We sat at a table with a bunch of my friends. Baby E sat strapped into the booster seat. I had another device for Jessie. It wasn’t meant to boost but rather keep the child from falling out of the chair. I didn’t install it all that well and Jessie wriggled out of it when she was done sitting.
These luncheons with my moms’ group are informative and fun. Not only do we all learn something from the speaker, but I get foster parent education credits. Today’s topic was Promoting Healthy Eating in Infants, Toddlers, and Preschoolers. The speaker was one of the extraordinary doctors at Children’s Medical Center.
I was so excited about this luncheon. I want to have healthy eaters who do not have issues with food. We learned in our foster parent training that we may not use food as a punishment. No, we may not send the children to bed without supper. It’s a completely different issue, however, if the children choose to not eat what’s given to them and still go to bed hungry.
I swear toddlers live on air. I have yet to meet a toddler who’s a good eater and yet they manage to grow anyway. Jessie is a grazer. She loves to ask for whatever food she’s feeling at the moment and then not eat it. As long as I give her healthy options to eat, she’ll be fine.
We learned that the toddler taste and smell senses are much keener than ours. Food that smells deliciously yummy to us may be overpoweringly strong to them. That explains a lot of toddlers’ resistance to trying new things. Serve food that’s cool to cold and toddlers may be more willing to taste. I’m going to give it a try.