I had a very squirmy Elizabeth in my arms who would scream if anyone else held her so I didn't even try to hand her off to the other moms who were more than willing to help. She currently has stranger anxiety and separation anxiety issues.
Matthew wasn't too thrilled about using his hands to spread the sauce, cheese, and pepperoni but thankfully one of the teachers helped Matthew through it. He doesn't have a severe aversion to textures or mess but if you gave him the option to use a tool than touch the sauce with his hands, he would go for the tool. So this was a good experience for him. It probably would be a good experience for me too as I don't like to get my hands dirty if I don't have to.
He was looking quite overwhelmed with the new experience and noise after making his pizza and wanted me to hold him. We sat in a booth with one of his classmates. A box of juice made things better for Matthew. Elizabeth was content with her bottle of milk.
His pizza was brought to our table. His usual reaction to new food could involve saying 'no,' turning away, pushing the food away, kissing the food, pretending to bite it, or throwing a tantrum. So I offered him a slice. He bit off a piece of pepperoni, chewed it, held it, and continued to eat the rest of the slice on his own. I was sitting next to him picking my jaw off the floor. And I thought to myself, "Bill would be so proud." Bill's favorite pizza (and primary food when growing up) is pepperoni. Those who know Bill well will testify that he lived on wheat thins, pizza, and pepsi.
I was ecstatic! This was his first time to eat a slice of pizza. More importantly, this is a big step toward our goal of Matthew eating more types of non-Gerber food.
I warmed up the pizza in the oven for dinner and served it in the same box at dinner. He was actually excited to see the pizza and ate 2 slices.
This is a huge success for someone who has been a difficult eater. He had been on 2nd stage and 3rd stage baby food until November last year. It wasn't until he was accepting more store-bought toddler food, as well as some of my home creations, when were finally able to wean him off baby food.
We still have a long way to go in our attempt to add to his "accepted foods" list. I think we can now add pepperoni pizza to the list.
6 comments:
love this pizza making caption.. Matthew's so generous by sharing his ham to others! Cute~~ :)
What a great field trip, and woo hoo on the pizza eating! Awesome!!! Beats baby food anyday eh Matthew!
That's awesome!! Although--you may want to save the box for the next "freezer" pizza--but it in there--and see if he'll think it's the same :)
Great video too!
Mary
What a terrific post! I'll pass on my own experience with food (learned from other moms more experienced than I am): When children are involved in MAKING the food they often are more receptive to it. Not always, but worth considering whether this was an influential factor in the pizza outing.
Glad he enjoyed it. He probably wasn't able to resist the smell. Yummm.
I've read that often picky eaters will often try foods if they've helped make them. I've been lucky with mine that they will try things even if they won't eat them.
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