Love, Logic and Baby Food

So this past Saturday I attended a Love and Logic conference in Arvada with my best friend Desiree and her sister-in-law Melissa. It was very interesting to hear what the authors of the book had to offer in terms of giving a little extra guidance on how to handle certain behaviors and how to actually use some of the techniques that they give in the book. But as in all parenting advice and techniques, I take a little from each and make my own concoction of discipline, rules, and consequences. Owen is a quick learner and he knows almost all the tricks I come up with to get him to comply, so I often find myself looking for the next best solution to the current behavior problem. The latest problem is listening. The child is simply too busy to listen to what's being asked of him at the moment. He's either too busy talking, playing, or watching TV (yes, my child watches what I consider to be a healthy amount of TV!) So the Love and Logic discipline teaches compliance through choices that the parent can live with and consequences to that must be followed through with when the choice isn't made by the child. They also include an "Uh-oh" song that your are supposed to SING when you are sending them to their room for some "time away from the family" as opposed to Time Out; and they advise you to sing it because you can't use anger in your voice when you are using a sing-songy voice. Makes sense, but is very hard to put into everyday use when you are a yeller by nature! So for now Owen is good at making choices, his toys go to toy jail when he fails to comply and we still use the naughty spot technique learned from the Supernanny. Its a mix that changes on a daily basis to meet Owen's behavior and attitude for the day. So far though, from all the discipline techniques I've read up about and contemplated my favorite saying is from the Love and Logic book: "I love you too much to argue."

So I thought I'd share some tips for other mommas out there (the ones that actually read me) about how I make my own baby food. When Owen was a baby I decided that I wanted to make his food at home because no matter what they try to sell in the baby food jars that say "no preservatives added" I still can't quite grasp that the bananas in the jar stay yellow without any additives - mine always turn to the natural brown! So since I learned with Owen I am repeating with Joey. Not only is it easy, but it saves money and waste with no little jars to toss! I have a couple of books that I use as my reference and guide for recipes and storing, "Blender Baby Food" and "Super Baby Food". I just recently made Joey a batch of organic red apples that I purchased at the Commissary for about $1.50 and it was enough to make two ice cube trays full as well as a couple of small containers. I store by freezing the food in ice cube trays (I cover the trays with foil while freezing to prevent any contamination from anything in the freezer):

The picture above is from the day I made both apples and sweet potatoes. I purchased about 4 medium sized sweet potatoes and boiled them for about an hour, peeled the skins and threw them in the blender with some nursery water, poured them in the ice cube trays and here they are ready to freeze and store. Each ice cube measures out to just over 1 tablespoon worth of food and in the beginning he'll eat about one cube per meal, when he gets older he bumps up to 2 or 3 cubes per meal.

After the cubes are nice and frozen I place them in freezer safe bags, label them with the name, date made and how long they are good in the freezer. As Joey gets older I can stop using the blender and start mashing the food with a potato masher to give the food some texture. I found that my Owen is not at all a picky eater and I really think it's because I made all his baby food. To get some good meal ideas I occasionally browse the baby food aisle and look at the combinations - like chicken and pears or ham and apples (those were a couple of Owen's favorites). The only two foods you are not supposed to make at home are carrots (too much zinc) and ham (too much sodium) so those are about the only two items I purchase in jars. So when I am ready to make a meal with the cubes I usually set them up three days at time and put the cubes in sealed baby food bowls in the fridge and let them thaw, when in a pinch to thaw I just zap 'em in the microwave. Then when serving I sneak in the boring old rice cereal or oatmeal so he's getting the extra nutrition without the added fuss!

Simple, easy, healthy, logical (especially with today's continuous food scares!)