Lip-smackin' good

For several weeks now, we've had Rachel on solids. Only once a day, usually at dinnertime, so she gets used to eating with us as a family. (She has been in a high chair so long that we don't remember a time when she wasn't at eye level with us). We started with rice cereal, and when she let most of it dribble out of her mouth, we switched to the good (i.e., interesting) stuff: Squash and sweet potatoes. All organic.

I was going to save the sweet foods -- fruit -- for later, until she had gotten her fill of veggies. But when she appeared to be headed toward constipation last week, I broke down and bought pureed pears and prunes. (New moms take note: Any fruit with a "p," I'm told, will get that baby poop flowing fast again!) Well, she LOVED the pears. The prunes, not so much. Tonight she ended up getting most of them on her arms, her fingers, her mouth and cheeks. We switched to rice cereal in the middle of it, and she lunged for the spoon as if we'd been starving her to death.

Mind you, she seems to be much more interested in grownup food. I can no longer safely hold her on my lap when I eat. At breakfast on Sunday, her little hand shot out for the crumb-topped coffee cake, and I had to put her back in the high chair where she happily played with her toys.

She also smacks her lips at odd moments of the day. It appears to have nothing to do with mealtime -- she'll just press her lips together for the sound it makes, then stop. But her mommy is still dreaming of the day when Rachel asks eagerly, "What's for dinner, Mom?" then proceeds to hoover up everything on her plate and end with, "Mom, you're the best cook in the whole wide world!"