A Tale of Two Eaters

I could not have more different eaters. I've decided that each boy represents a different end of the toddler eating spectrum and there seems to be nothing I can do to change that. Blaine has always been my good eater. He caught on to breast feeding easily and sometimes practically choked himself trying to consume his milk. Pierce was a little slower to latch and took his time. Shocker.

Thinking back though, Pierce did latch on to solids better initially. There were a few weeks in there where Blaine wouldn't even entertain the idea of pureed foods from a spoon going into this mouth. And apparently if it were up to Pierce he would still be eating mostly pureed foods. Blaine has done great with the transition to big boy foods, but Pierce will only eat certain things. He won't even try most foods and it can quickly lead to a meltdown if you try to make him or over-encourage. Blaine, on the other hand, will try practically everything and usually likes it. He likes most meats and pretty much eats whatever we're having for dinner. Both boys do great with breakfast, but it can typically go downhill from there for Pierce especially. And neither boy will eat real vegetables no matter what it is or how it's prepared. But they will still eat veggie baby food. I can't understand how they (P especially) would prefer plain pureed veggies over seasoned, prepared real vegetables. I'm pretty sure it's a concept thing at this point.

In any case, Pierce can just about put us both over the edge during dinner. We've agreed to only even attempt a handful of family meals throughout the week b/c it can be so stressful. My biggest fear is that he is going to end up a completely picky eater who is unopen to new foods and will only eat what he knows he likes. I wonder if I didn't introduce enough variety initially or what.  We're trying to get tough and we've never done the short order chef routine where we constantly fix him different things in hopes he'll eat. We usually offer him what we're having and if he won't eat that we give him a baby veggie and/or fruit. I want to get him off pureed altogether, but at least this way he's not getting rewarded for not eating what we eat.

Part of why I'm journaling about this is in hopes that I can look back in a few months and laugh about how worked up I was about this. I will look back and laugh, right?