Levi's Adventures in Food

Levi entered the world of food exploration at just about 6 months! We learned about a method called baby led solids, which introduces whole, solid foods from the very beginning. No rice cereal at 4 months or purees. While we believe that there is no one best method of doing anything with babies, the philosophy of baby led solids made sense to us. Babies get to make choices from the very beginning and eat as much or as little as they want in the early stages. Food before 1 is just for fun!

We started with avocado, which Levi seemed to like despite the fact that it was a little overly ripe for him to handle. He truly enjoyed licking his fingers! We followed with broccoli, teething toast, sweet potato, egg yolk, asparagus, zucchini, carrot, guacamole and now banana. His early favorites were broccoli, sweet potato and egg yolk. At the beginning he mostly just licked and sucked on his food but quickly got the hang of what to do with the food once it got to his mouth. He quickly learned how to bite small pieces off and how to keep it in his mouth instead of spitting it out. In the first few weeks, he would get frustrated at times but once he got into it he did just fine.

We gave most of his foods to him in stick shapes so he could grab onto one end and eat at the other.  With baby led solids, you don’t spoon feed  - you let them decide what to pick up and eat. At first, he had no interest in eating from a spoon but we worked on it and he got the hang of it quick. We are still working on him using the spoon, so we help, but he eats his yogurt willingly. Once he developed the pincer grasp at around 8 months, he had more fun with small foods.

We started him in our travel high chair  (highly recommend the phil & ted’s travel high chair.) and moved him into his big high chair at about 7 months. He sits at the head of the table and each of us sits next to him. At first he looked like he was swimming in his high chair, so you can really tell how much bigger he’s gotten.

Now Levi can pretty much eat anything we eat, but his ultimate favorites are turkey meatballs, greek yogurt, bananas, strawberries, oranges and pears. See a pattern? Yes, despite our best efforts to introduce vegetables first, he still loves fruit more. It has been so much fun to watch him try new foods - both meals we cook at home and meals we eat out. He will always accept puffs or mum mums for a snack!

We hope that baby led solids promotes healthy eating, results in an adventurous eater! So far so good!

A montage of his food journey so far...

Wow has it been awhile

Yes, it has been awhile since we've posted, and this will be a long post to play catch-up. The Rosenfelds have been very busy with Jeff's new job and an active little guy. The weeks are just flying by. Hard to believe that in just about 6 weeks our little guy will be 1. How did that happen?!?!

Quick summary of the last few months - 

Months 7 & 8...

• At 30 weeks old he was 17 pounds, 8 ounces – still on the petite side (go figure)
• He started to wear his 6 – 9 month close at 8 months and he has quite the 6 - 9 month wardrobe.
• Levi started to master rolling to get things that he wanted. He had never been a big fan of being on his tummy, but once he was able to roll consistently and efficiently, he didn’t mind it so much. He wasn't quite getting onto his hands and knees but he was pretty good at falling onto his hands from a sitting position
• He continued to be very curious and very observant...loves to take everything in and just watch people
• He became a pro at putting his pacifier in by himself
• Levi started sleeping like a pro. We started to put him down by 8 and he’d sleep until 6:30- 7 (with a dream feed).
• Poor guy got his first BIG cold in January, and I had to stay home for the first time. He had a lingering cough, which definitely impacted his sleep. It was not fun for any of us, but worst for the little guy!
• He started to nap much better. We got him down to 2 naps a day on the weekends but he still took 2 – 3 naps a day at day care. He started to take full hour and a half naps with a little help getting through the first sleep cycle
• We had to keep all dishes and silverware far away from him
• He became one of the oldest babies in daycare because a couple of the toddlers moved up and 3 other babies started so he was one of the oldest kids
• We went through a rough patch with the bath. Levi screamed every time he was in the bath because he didn’t like water getting into his face (probably mommy’s fault)
• We bought Levi a jumper that hangs over the door and he loves it
• BeBe & Granddad came up to visit at the end of January and Buddy & Bettie came out to visit in February. Levi always has so much fun with his grandparents and misses them so much in between visits. Thank goodness for facetime!
• We took an overnight trip up to San Francisco over President's Day Weekend to 'get out of town.' We did a little shopping went out to dinner and enjoyed a little time away from home as a family. Two nights would have been even better!

First big cold :(

One of mommies favorite outfits

Matching with daddy

With his buddies Harry and Jason

Cutest pajamas ever

Check me out!

8 months and barely sitting still

Enjoying my tummy

Daycare's solution to Levi's long hair

Yes, that is a pink clip in his hair

Happy Valentine's Day!

Sporting his shades

Rolling around on our hotel bed

Visiting with Bettie

 Months 9 & 10...

• At Levi's 9 month visit he weighed in at 19 pounds, 10 ounces and was 26 inches long (still petite)
• He's still been in mostly 6 - 9 month clothes
• Levi has gone from rolling to get places to the full blown army crawl, and it happened very quickly. In the last 2 months, he has gotten fast doing his one foot push and he doesn't seem to want to get up on his knees just yet. With all of his moving and shaking, its getting harder and harder to take pictures of our little guy
• Levi loves to dance when music comes on. Many of his toys have music and when the music starts and stops, Levi goes from sitting still to swaying back and forth. He loves his little egg shakers.
• Some of his favorite toys are his stacking cups. He will do almost anything to get his hands on those cups!
• We decided to change daycare at the beginning of April. With daddy's new job in San Jose, dropping Levi off in Sunnyvale each morning just didn't make sense. We were lucky enough to find a daycare less than 10 minutes from the house which is much more convenient to home. Levi is still transitioning but he has 2 little buddies that are within 2 months of his age.  
• Levi started to pull up at the end of March. He has not mastered the skill just yet and tends to get a little frustrated because it is not too easy for him
• He has been a little more clingy over the last month. The separation anxiety has set in a little more at the 9 - 10 month mark. He is still pretty independent though when he plays but definitely prefers for us to be close
• We took 2 trips over the last couple of months. The first was to Tahoe. There were 4 families all with kids, so we had a lot of fun. We also went to Bodega Bay a few weeks ago with a few of our friends. All of us have kids under Levi's age. We played a lot, enjoyed the beautiful views and walking to the beach. Both trips were too short!
• BeBe and Granddad come visit for an early passover. We played a lot, cooked a lot and had a great time. Its always hard to see them go!
• He is exploring a lot of new foods and eats mostly what we eat now (more on adventures in food in a separate post)

Big boy drinking out of a big cup with BeBe's help

BeBe cuddles

Pulling up to his knees 

Pulling up to his feet 

Auntie J love

Little buddies

With Miss Raquel on his last day at Caring Hearts

With Miss Rose on his last day at Caring Hearts

Taking in the bayside views in Bodega Bay

Giggles with mommy

Bayside beachtime with Daddy

Meeting Great Uncle Marty and Corinne

10 months!

More again sooner rather than later...

Levi's First Hanukkah

Hanukkah came and went so fast - as it always does. I am always surprised at how fast 8 days flies by.

BeBe and Granddad gave Levi a fun hanukkiah with his name on it! So for his first Hanukkah ever we lit his hanukkiah each night. Each night we lit the candles, 'opened' a present from us and from BeBe and Granddad (and we took pictures of it all).

Levi was amazed by the candles, staring at them and grabbing at them (since he's really into grabbing these days). We were very careful to keep our distance so he wasn't able to successfully grab at the candles.

A few highlights from our festival of lights.

Levi opens his Hanukkiah from BeBe and Granddad

First night

Second night 

Levi opens his big dreidel from Bebe and Granddad

Third Night

Fourth Night

Clothes!

Giants Baby Giraffe 

Night Seven 

Levi's very own kippah with his name crocheted

Levi's BIG gift from mommy and daddy

Family photo on the eight night

With daddy on night eight

With mommy on night eight 

Levi's fully lit hanukkiah

Surprise Visit to L.A.

Last weekend we flew down to L.A. to surprise BeBe and Granddad for their 40th wedding anniversary and for the first night of Hanukkah. Boy were they surprised! They had NO idea that we were coming. We had planned to FaceTime with them to light candles for the first night of Hanukkah and showed up at the front door instead!

Aunt B and Uncle Dean graciously picked us up at the airport, and we stopped by Whole Foods to pick up Hanukkah dinner feast of latkes, chicken and veggies..

We knocked on the door and when my mom asked who it is was, I had no idea what to say, so I just said "Open the door". Some of our favorite BeBe responses were "oh my gosh, you have to be kiding," "I don't believe this" and "oh my gosh, you should not do this". It was a blast!

We all lit candldes together on Levi's first night of Hanukkah. It was so nice to all be together. What a worlwind of a trip but so glad we did it! They'll never forget their 40th anniversary, that's for sure!



Quick picture of us before leaving L.A.



Levi's first night of Hanukkah



Little buddies

Christina and Levi