Finger Food Ideas for a Spoon-grabbing Little One

When I started giving my kids food at that age I would chew up what I was eating and form it into ball for them to grab. Seems a bit yucky for some but it worked for me:-) This is a traditional way of giving kids food. My second child who is now a year never ate "baby food." If you are interested in some great read (short) about giving babies "real" food you can consider the following sites and books:

http://realbabyfood.info/

http://www.westonaprice.org/children/index.html#fd

One of my son's favorite snacks at this age was an apple microwaved with cinnamon. i would cut the apple in half, sprinkle with cinnamon and microwave for 60 secs. Then cut into tiny bites.

The little diced dried apples are great, yogurt puffs, cheerios, they all dissolve quite a bit on the tongue. Zwieback toast is also great. Let her "explore" with the spoon and some baby food, she will be in heaven :)

My little one started on finger foods early too and she didn't get teeth until she was one. We starte her with peas and geber puffs (because they melt in your mouth). Pretty soon she was eating everything that we were eating. You can pretty much give her any veggies steamed soft and cut into small pieces. Butternut squash is a good one for fall and is always a big hit at my house. When you are ready to start meat I found that canned chicken was really easy for my daughter to chew. It's really soft. Good luck!!

Hi S.,

Baby finger foods usually melt easily with the saliva in your baby's mouth. They do not really need teeth to eat most of them.

My younger children liked the Gerber fruit snacks, finger foods - puffs (shaped like stars and come in flavors), and yogurt chips.

But remember to watch her carefully when she is trying these things, she may still choke on it, but they do melt quickly, usually fast enough to the little ones dont have a chance to choke on them.

As her teeth start coming in, my children also like the biter biscuits. I used them for teething, it was massaging on their gums, and they drooled alot to moisten them and making them soft. Just be sure not to give her small bites, let her chew/gnaw on the whole thing, watching carefully for pieces that break off for her to choke on, and take them away.

slices of bananas are great - cut up small, gerber cookies, cheerios, my son loved blueberries - i would actually cut them up the first few times.. then he would chew so good. so i stopped cutting them up, pieces of cheese, grapes are good but cut up in 3 or 4 pieces, watermelon is excellent, i let him chew on corn on the cobb.. both my kids loved corn like this.. noodles - pasta, cut up cooked carrots, peas, just look around.. if it's small and soft.. go for it.. good luck

My son LOVED the "puffs". They come in many flavors and basically disolve in their mouths. She's a little young to be able to get them into her mouth, but once she figures it out she will probably love them too!

I would also suggest putting a couple of baby spoons on her highchair to play with. This is a great way for her to explore the utensils and get comfortable with them.

Gerber puffs are perfect for her age..they melt almost instantly in your mouth! or why not try steamed carrots that are very mushy or mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, steamed beets, something that can be cooked till almost mushy!