Almost a Year, WHAT Does She Eat!?

My son is 14 months and he's been on this eating schedule since he was 9 mos.

Breakfast @ 9: Yogurt and either cereal, waffle or toast, Milk
Lunch @ 11:45: Fruit and either milk or cheese (if he gets cheese, he drinks water)
Snack 4: crackers, cereal, teddy graham, animal crackers, etc., Water
Dinner 6: Meat, Veggies, Milk

Hi

Wow her brakfast is late...almost lunch time for us!!

Anyway my 1 yr old has bagel w/cream cheese , various kinds of cereals (cheerios , bran flakes , weetabix , shredded wheat), I always get a serving of fruit in at breakfast aswell , like a banana or some strawberries.

Lunch time is a sandwich of some sort , cream cheese & ham , cheese , sometimes jam (jelly), with a yogurt , and maybe some raisins or crackers of some sort.

Then evening meal is whatever we are eating , lasagne , spaghetti and meat sauce , pasta in a veggie pasta sauce(home made), rice , omelette with some veggies on the side.

I know you said you and your husband don't eat regluar and you are not able to sit down at the same time , so you could try keeping some aside from the nignt before for her and that way you don't have to panic at the last minute that you have nothing made for her and end up giving her cans of ravioli....if she likes ravioli though you could buy her the fresh ravioli and make a pasta sauce for it which freezes really well.

Hope this helps

K.

First off, you are concerned about your child which is great but you should be just as concerned about yourself and your husband(and he should be as well)! After all that is where children learn the most, from following their parents. My son usually eats cereal for breakfast, we started with cheerios and worked our way up-he is almost 3 now and would eat strawberry frosted mini wheats with milk all day if we let him! For lunch he usually eats at the sitters but she gives him a smaller version of what we might have for dinner like a small grilled breast of chicken, a veggie and a starch. We found that he loves chicken nuggets but he hasn't taken to any of the foods that kids normally love like hot dogs or macaroni and cheese or even ravioli. He loves corn, yogurt, carrots, broccoli when you cook it with some butter, hamburgers, pizza, spaghetti... He goes through phases though. We started with a lot of the toddler foods on the baby food isle and just worked more of the foods we eat in. He liked green beans and sweet potatoes at one time but now he won't always eat them. He loves bananas, apples and apple sauce. We just offer him things but only recently did we start to make the rule of he must have at least one bite of each food on his plate. We don't really offer him anything we don't know he ate at one time already so we don't feel one bite is asking too much. A lot of times after he has one bite he will eat more :) And if he doesn't we tell him no dessert or "cereal" unless he eats one bite of each food so if all he eats is a bite he gets a small bowl of cereal for dessert :P We just try to get a good balance at meals throughout the day and small healthy snacks in between. Good luck!

You can feed her simply and feed her what you eat. My family's meals revolve around a main dish and then we add veggies as a side. I think you need to work towards a more balanced diet. Some ideas would be:

Breakfast: A scrambled egg yolk with cheese, banana and cheerios, yogurt with some fruit mixed in, toast with a baby food puree on top (I do apple, banana, pear, apricot, pretty much anything), but I would avoid jelly because it's pretty much just sugar

Lunch: Grilled cheese, quesadilla with cheese and veggies, brocolli and cheese nuggets,

Dinner: Pasta w/ a meat, meatballs and veggies, any kind of fruit with a meat

I try to shoot for protein at one meal, veggies at one meal, and fruit at one meal. Then you can compliment each meal with other food groups, but you get in the most important ones. If you are worried about what you eat then try to make your food simpler. Add salt after you've taken out her serving. At a year she can have most things but nut products, and fish. And most likely you want to avoid spicy things. As long as its not a choking hazard try it with her! Most likely she won't like all flavors, but you might find some things she doesn't like that you wouldn't expect.

The previous poster had some great ideas. It's time for a lot more variety. I would dump the canned ravioli or any other processed foods even if she likes them -- the sauces are full of sugars, and get rid of jelly for the same reason. You can puree fruits for toppings or get fruit-only, no-addition fruit spreads (be sure to check labels as you don't want artificial sweeteners either). You didn't indicate that she's eating dairy yet; if not, talk to the doctor about timing and maybe introduce it gradually in case it upsets her tummy or she has an allergy, but if she can eat dairy, then low-sugar yogurt is a good protein source (you can even buy plain yogurt and add fruit purees) and cheese is good for protein and calcium as well. Pasta is fine, but go for whole wheat -- it does not break down in the body as fast (when pasta or bread etc. are made of white flour, they break down faster into sugars in our bodies and we feel hungrier sooner; whole wheat pastas and breads are slower to break down and also contain more nutrients and fiber that haven't been stripped away! Try her on rice too. Same goes for brown rice compared to white.). If she likes green beans, try her on black beans, chickpeas, etc. Be sure to cook well (or to rinse canned ones well). She may be ready for oatmeal too, but please not the instant kind loaded with chemical flavorings--get her used to real oatmeal now and she'll learn to love it, plus it's cheaper too and you can make it in the microwave in two minutes. It's not too soon for broccoli or cauliflower either--steam them pretty soft for her and be aware they can make kids a bit gassy, especially if undercooked. Look online -- there are healthy "cooking for kids" recipes and cookbooks.

Now is the time to experiment and have fun with it, so she develops a taste for new foods and also so she doesn't develop a taste for lots of juices, jellies, sweetened cereals and oatmeals, etc. Have fun with it.