Childminder criticised my parenting

[PrincessMummy13]

My 11 month old DD recently started at a childminders when I returned to work. Have known childminder for years, she is lovely and my DD is always happy to see her and happy when I pick her up.
However when I picked DD she asked to have a word as she had a couple of issues.
She has said I don't dress my girl appropriately for the setting and for her development. I like to dress my DD nicely in pretty, girly dresses and little cardigans, she looks so cute in them.
The childminder said that my DD is often too cold and the dresses get in the way when DD is rolling round on the floor etc.
She suggested I keep the frilly dresses for parties and put DD in leggings and tops for her house.
She then went on to say the food I give to DD is not really appropriate either. She said I give her too much sugary and salty foods and not enough lumps.
She said she only has my DD's interests at heart and she was really worried about saying something as she didn't want to attack me.
WWYD?

Your daughter will still be pretty, even if she's not wearing dresses. Beauty is more than what you wear.

Most childrens centres can advise and help you with cooking and diet. Stop giving her purées. At 11 months I bet she'd love to get her hands on a boiled potato or a sandwich and get it all over herself!

I think you & DH need to re-educate yourselves in regards to a healthy balanced diet. There is enough info pumped at you from every angle about healthy foods OP. Use the internet to look them up.

OP i know where you are coming from not being able to cook. My cooking is shocking and i rarely eat fruit and veg.
But when DS was born (he is 9 now) i had to learn. You can't feed a baby on ready meals and snacks.
Learn the basics first like doing carrots and broccoli, you only have to boil them. I used to send DS with a bit of roast chicken, carrot and broccoli and then a fromage frais for pud.
I used to spend saturday morning cooking and freezing his meals for the next week. I used to put them in them Nuby pots as they were a good portion size for him (i hope you can stilll get them!).
You don't have to eat he veg yourself. Although it would be good if DD sees you eating some healthy food every now and again. IMO Carrots are the lesser evil of veg if your willing to try.
I would avoid mini cheddars and gravy coz they are full of salt and not good for little ones.
Sometimes i would do DS scrambled egg on toast for breakfast coz its another easy thing and not too bad to salvage if you mess up.

So just start off with the basic. Get a simple learn to cook book and give it a try. Its worth the effort if you end up with a healthy child

Don't feel bad op, plenty of people only learn to cook when they have children.

For the moment though, there's some really easy changes you could make:
Breakfast - weetabix and a banana is good and super easy. I'd get rid of the fruit pots and just give fruit, it doesn't need to be mushed at her age.

Lunch - Babies love sandwiches generally. Of course they pull them apart, eat the filling and then suck the bread, but that's fine. Cheese, ham, mashed avocado or banana or peanut butter (once she's 1yr old) are all great.

Dinner - eggs are very quick and easy and a great source of protein. Scrambled eggs, some veg sticks and toast, and you have a balanced meal. Decent fish fingers are fine, just make sure they're the fish fillet ones and keep an eye on the salt.

As far as snacks go, I'd try to avoid sweet stuff apart from fruit. So maybe crackers, breadsticks, veg and hummus, oatcakes and hummus (hummus is great stuff and babies love it ime), cheese cubes.

And teach yourself to cook simple things you can batch cook and stick in the freezer - bolognaise, fish pie, that sort of thing. Loads and loads of recipes online.

Listen to your childminder.

Can you ask your health visitor if there are some parenting classes nearby you can attend?

There is more to parenting than dressing a child like a pretty doll. Your daughter is a little person, she needs clothes to keep her warm that she feels comfortable in. She also needs appropriate food and drink. Malnutrition through convenience food and mush is not great to put it mildly.

If you go on the way you do, she is going to be extremely unhealthy, overweight, and without teeth, and with some pretty serious food issues.

I was all ready to get a long post about how I'm a shocking cook and rarely cook myself but it's still quite easy to make sure your DC have a healthy diet, especially for packed lunches, lots of fruit and veg and things like oatcakes and cheese and humous and hard boiled eggs...

And then read the latest comments. Oh well.

OP, put her leggings and tunic, make her a ham sandwich, and give frozen peas and sweetcorn, you don't even need to cook those.

I think this is a reverse AIBU. The NN is pure satire surely?

It doesn't matter if the OP is legit or not.. There are people who feed their kids like that because they don't know any different and there are some good ideas to change foods. Somebody reading might not know that loads of gravy isn't suitable for little bodies.

I remember that baby that died story because it was weaned on mash and gravy.. too much salt isn't good.

I can well believe this,some people have no idea about feeding children.

Op.

Ask your MIL for help,if she is willing to cook for you then she will be willing to teach you.

Oh. My. Word. The clothes are an obvious one to fix easily. But the diet?! And your Mil batch cooks for you and DH for the week? Please, for your your DD's sake, get yourself onto a parenting course ASAP and buy a cookbook. Unbelievable. Literally.

Ok, I cannot cook. My DD still tells stories about me setting fire to toast twice in one day.

However, I have learned to cook for my DD. We eat fruit and veg and she loves it. I think you need to reassess your diet for the sake of your DD's diet. Fruit and veg are essential components and ready meals don't cut it. The high salt levels in ready meals are also not suitable for a child, so you need to formulate a plan for how you are going to feed your daughter long term.

I would suggest attending a cooking class, or buying an easy recipe book. I have one that is aimed at students living away for the first time that I found really useful. Its not all jargon and fancy words like a lot of cook books, just simple instructions.

Your DD will drink water. If that is all that is offered, she will drink it.

I agree with previous posters that a few small changes would make a big difference. Don't start by trying to cook fancy food for her - begin with simple stuff and build your confidence.

Breakfasts of Weetabix and milk or porridge (really easy in the microwave and you don't need to buy special microwaveable sachet type stuff, so very cheap too)

Snacks of unsalted rice cakes (Kallo do delicious ones), oatcakes, cubes of cheese, cut up fruit.

Lunch of a cheese, ham or tuna mayo sandwich.

Dinner of fish fingers, sausages, chunks of roast chicken or beef (from MIL perhaps? ), pasta with some tomato sauce (or even heated passata would do) and some vegetables is ideal. I couldn't survive without my freezer and DS lives off frozen veg (peas, sweetcorn, mixed veg, all microwaved from frozen) but it's good for him and he's learning about healthy eating.

I'd limit to one pudding a day if you must (custard or fromage frais as they're surprisingly sugary) and switch to water from juice.

If you're not used to cooking then it probably feels overwhelming but it really isn't and you'd be giving your daughter the best possible start.

Why not post in Weaning for more ideas?

Sorry but your CM is right, her diet is not good.

Rusks are full of sugar, as is baby juice, cake and little yoghurts. Why does she need cake everyday? Gravy and mini chedders are full of salt.

Just because you don't like fruit and veg doesn't mean you should be avoiding giving it to your dd. You can learn how to cook, even if it's juts boiling some veg. Give her pieces of fruit and carrot sticks. She doesn't need everything mashed at her age.

And I agree with the dresses thing, leggings are practical.

And scrambled eggs are easy enough if you don't know how to cook.. break egg into bowl, add a bit of milk, whisk with a fork and stick in the microwave for 4 minutes or so.

Thing is, I genuinely think you can get through feeding kids well without even having to learn to cook very well at all. Roast a few veg and make a pasta sauce, scrambled eggs and low-salt beans, fish fingers, bolognese, even making a stew with one of those Coleman's packets. You don't need to be a cordon bleu chef by any means. They could eat pasta, sauce and vegetables for every meal if that's what you can manage.

Agree about the frill dresses - they're just not practical.

Haven't read what you've said about food yet, but I think she's sensible to ask you to lay off the frilly dresses.

Maybe you could mention that when new families come to her, she could mention a dress code (sounds too formal, but you get my drift,) when she first meets the parents, so as to avoid any future parents feeling embarrassed/upset.

Um

Not sure if genuine or no

I agree with your CM sorry. You feed DD lots of processed crap and dress her inappropriately. I think it's great your CM raised concerns as you can do a lot to change things. It's actually quite easy to learn to cook and I speak as someone who couldn't even cook a sausage pre kids. On your shoes I'd find a few recipes you want to learn to cook, chuck out all the processed and sugary foods, eat some veg

Natural plain yoghurt mixed with a few mushed up berries. (Buy a large frozen punnet and take out a few the night before to defrost). Goes down really well with baby.

Plain white fish fillets, very easy to cook and quick. With broccoli and cauliflower florets and rice. (Use frozen veg if you want).

Mixed veg, again frozen is really quick and easy. Babies like the fact it's small and colourful. Literally takes 5 mins to heat up, put in a bowl and it's a nice snack. With a couple of cheese cubes thrown in!

A small jacket potato with tuna, mild onions and pepper. I hand baby little bits of it, he really likes it.

Big rice cakes, with no added salt. Cheaper then buying specific baby food.

Frozen bananas go down really well. Peel banana, cut in half, wrap in foil and freeze. Lovely. It may discolour slightly but it's gorgeous! Good on gums too. You have to hold it because it's so cold. Or it may go in one of them holding contraptions you can buy.

Your CM is right, and is being very responsible in talking to you about it.

If you give your daughter water to drink that's what she'll drink. If you take the water away and offer her juice then of course she'll take instead. If you offer a child broccoli and they say they don't like it, do you then say "OK, have some chocolate instead"? No; you say this is what there is.

You and your dh need to improve your own diet too, I'm afraid.

Argh been trying to post for ages but my laptop kept freezing.
Sorry this is a reverse, wasn't intending to wind anyone up. I just wanted an idea of reactions.
I am the childminder, I have known the Mum and Dad for years and the child is my Goddaughter.

Oh dear OP, are you bored?