rice cereal bites

Today, Saturday. 

Matt was on a train early this morning, returns late this evening. 

In the early afternoon Luke was newly up from his nap and my other two boys were sleeping.  I decided it was the perfect time to start some solids. 

My girls both started later than this, and Isaac about the six month mark, so this feels a bit early to me.  (Luke only 5 and a half months.) But Luke is such a big boy, and I just feel like I can't keep up with his nutritional demands.  Not like a few bites of rice cereal are going to really contribute much to his caloric intake for now, but I figured it couldn't hurt.  Plus, give him some time and he'll really be chowing down.  (Now to the annoying part, and much of the reason I love to delay solids: making food and storing food and traveling with food and .... well, I'm about to talk myself out of solids!)

And when he spent the last two days perfecting his sit it seemed like one more vote for starting solids now!

He's still a bit topple-y but getting better every hour.  Now if he can just figure out how to push himself off his tummy and onto his bottom he'll really be golden.  In the meantime, he has two sisters who are willing to help him get back up into the sitting position. 

So the girls (who have been eager to start feeding Luke since early summer) and I got the little man all ready, mixed up some rice cereal and picked out our spoons.

This is Luke's game face.  The boy is just happy.  A lot. 

And this is his "what in the world did you just put in my mouth" face!  He came around pretty quickly and I'm confident some rice cereal actually entered his digestive tract.

Lydia was dancing and bouncing in anticipation of "her turn" feeding.... I figured I'd better let her at it before she knocked the high chair over.  If both girls can keep up this "let me feed him" spirit we'll be golden... unfortunately I'm thinking the glory will fade and I'll be left spooning oatmeal and mashed pumpkin at this precious little guy with no help from the big sisters! 

Julianna was at my side, photographing (and videoing) the whole event.  She got a camera as her (very early) birthday present from my parents. 

And she loves it. 

This seems like a milestone.  My littlest... and he's moving on to some real-deal food.  Baby Luke, not too fast buddy.  No growing up too fast.