Look What I Can Do!

Yesterday evening as I was feeding Austin his well-balanced dinner of yogurt and oatmeal, he kept trying to steal the spoon from me or trying to knock it out of my hand...sending a gooey mess flying all over the place. Since he seemed to be so interested in that spoon, I just decided to give it to him and see if we could work on his self-feeding skills (considering there was already a mess to be cleaned up).

While I know it's about time for him to start mastering this skill, I have been dreading teaching him because of the mess I knew it would cause. I hope that doesn't make me a bad mommy, but I really don't mind feeding him...however, I can already foresee trouble when baby H and Austin need to eat at the same time and I don't have enough arms to feed them both!

So anyway, I gave Austin and spoon and after banging it on his tray for awhile he finally decided to dip it into his oatmeal. The first few spoonfuls went straight into his lap, but right when I was about to call it quits, he took a good spoonful and put it in his mouth! I started clapping and smiling and praising him uncontrollably and he seemed to like the positive attention so much that he kept doing it! I was so proud of my little guy and he seemed quite pleased with himself as well. He continued to spoon in that oatmeal until he was no longer able to get enough on his spoon and then it was straight into the tub!

Now if only I can convince myself to ignore the possible mess and keep letting him try...he may master this spoon-feeding skill long before I ever imagined!