Monday, February 23, 2009

Negotiating with Terrorists

Sara Beth likes bananas much better than oatmeal.  Heather thinks that they might be her favorite food.  I began feeding her breakfast on Sunday, but when Heather walked by pealing her banana, SaraB decided she no longer wanted to eat any more boring cereal.  She would become distracted and if I brought a spoonful of oatmeal to her mouth, she would shut her mouth up tight.  If, however, I brought the tasty yellow fruit near, her mouth would open up ready to grab a mouthful.  For a while we were at an impasse.  I decided that she needed to finish her cereal, she decided that she was going to have a banana.  A compromise was reached; three or four bites of cereal and then a bite or two of banana.  Sometimes she would try to cut short the process and demanded her "monkey bite" before a full 3 bites of cereal, but she caved and I prevailed.  She almost ate the entire banana, but she also ate the whole bowl of food.  Heather dodged the whole issue by mixing the banana into the cereal this morning. 

Most times that I get to play with Sara Beth in the play room, I turn on the radio.  It is typically classical music.  Scott Joplin's Maple Leaf Rag began playing and I decided to bounce Sara Beth around the room in time with the music.  She loved it.  She bounced her legs, laughed, and had a giant smile painted across her face.  When the song came to an end and the bouncing stopped, she started to cry.  Fortunately, I was able to distract her with a rattle, but next time a fast song comes up on the radio, I'm going to bounce her around again.

Sara Beth has improved her crawling skills.  She will now army crawl across a room to get to a stuffed toy that she wants to play with, as long as she doesn't get distracted by something along the way.  

4 comments:

Melissa said...

smart mommy on the cereal and banana...she is just so cute, thanks for letting me hold her on Sunday....baby fever prevails!

The BushHerd said...

She is still not officially crawling...

Jenn said...

Your updates are always so good...great job Peter! What a treasure to be leaving your little girl as she will one day be able to look back on her life through the words of her father!

cmchrisk said...

She is getting so big... and I love the way she won you over with the banana! :)