The Mom I Want to Be

Babies quickly become antsy when sitting in a high chair.  If you find the child is grabbing the spoon from your hand when you try to feed him, consider giving him his own spoon.  He’ll love the independence of holding his own utensil.  More than likely he will bang it on the food tray, try to scoop out his food, make attempts of getting the spoon in his mouth, and even try to feed you.  Hold off on washing his face or wiping down the area between bites.  This may be messy, but its important to give him the time and space to experiment with self-feeding.  In fact, he may sit and eat for longer periods when given his own utensil.

 

Another way to hold baby’s interest at meal time is to hang an unbreakable mirror on a wall by his high chair so he can watch himself eat.

 

Set aside a cabinet or drawer in the kitchen just for your baby.   This can help occupy her while you are tending daily kitchen tasks and curb her interest in off limits areas of the kitchen.  Stock her special space with a changing array of plastic cups and containers for nesting and stacking, wooden spoons for banging, and plastic funnels and measuring cups for filling and pouring.

 

Replace tiny kitchen magnets which could pose a choking hazard with extra-large plastic magnetic alphabet letters.  Consider creating a morning ritual that involves checking the fridge each morning for the word of the day or a special message you’ve written out.  Buy self adhesive magnet sheets to make your own child safe magnets featuring pictures of her pets, family, baby faces from magazines, or cars that your toddler can vroom across the refrigerator.

 

Shop sales and thrift stores to find a plastic child size table and chair set for your kitchen.  Buy new paper tablecloths at a dollar store or discount party center.  Take out a new tablecloth each week and let baby decorate it with crayons or stickers to entertain imaginary tea party guests.  Help her come up with different decorating themes for a week, such as bugs, flowers, animals, fish, or silly faces.  This is a wonderful Monday Morning tradition, and she can add to her masterpiece each day.

 

Create a “sandbox” in the kitchen by filling a shallow plastic bin with dry macaroni or puffed rice cereal.  Keep measuring cups, colanders, bowls and sand pails and shovels on hand for digging and scooping the “sand”.  You could bury a hidden treasure in the sandbox each morning, such as a favorite stuffed animal, action figure, truck, or a packaged fruit snack.

 

If you have sturdy kitchen chairs, consider hanging toys from plastic chain links attached to the back rails.  This is a great way to situate toys at eye level and encourage crawlers to stand up with the aid of a chair and practice the fine art of balancing.

 

Create an obstacle course in the kitchen for cruisers.  Position four or more kitchen chairs about a foot away from one another.  Place a toy atop each chair seat and watch your cruiser cautiously move from one to next to investigate each exciting plaything.  Once he has mastered this course, position chairs further apart to give your cruiser the opportunity to take a few baby steps between them.

 

Rinse out yogurt containers to use as playthings in the kitchen.  Stack several in a pyramid formation on the kitchen floor, so you can playing a bowling game with baby, using a rubber ball.  You can place dry rice in a securely lidded yogurt container for fun to shake rattles or use the containers as handy on the go holders for crayons or snacks.

 

For hours of make believe fun, let toddlers set up shop in your kitchen.  Recycle empty cereal boxes, oatmeal containers, soda bottles, coffee canisters and egg cartons for thier pretend grocery store.  They can use a cardboard box as a front counter, food shaped magnets or plastic toy foods, paper bags for bagging the items, a wagon as a cart and paper money made from green construction paper.