Help! Packed lunches for a fussy 1 year old?

[wilsony]

Up to now Ive always given my baba organic jarred baby food and occasionally, home made stuff which she usually hates! I know some other mums who are giving their babies of the same age stuff like ham or tuna sandwiches, mange tout (yes, really) and shredded cheese but mine isnt interested! She'll take some finger foods like breadsticks, peas and those Organix carrot stick things but thats it. Shes at nursery 4 times a week and I do worry that the nursery staff think she should be off the mush too (and of course Im not asking them for fear of looking like the worried inexperienced first time Mum that I am) but what can I do? Any ideas?

wilsony, go on have a chat with the nursery staff. Trust me you're not the first nor the last to worry about what to feed her 1 year old .

I used to prepare food to take to cm who was looking after dd, but dd refused to eat it. However, she devoured anything the cm, who was pakistani and cooked accordingly, made.

What's a hit with my ds atm is pitta pockets filled with a bit of cheese and ham and put into the toasted sandwich machine then cut it into stripes. Even nice cold

Also carrot sticks with houmous are a favourite. A bit messy for a lunch box though.

Hi - I wouldn't worry and just do what is best for your baby. My ds is 2.2 and would not DREAM of eating a tuna sandwich even now and only a ham one if he was feeling particularily adventurous. Mange tout?? maybe if I liquidised it and slipped it in with something else .

When he was early 1s from memory, he was still not eating really involved finger food. Most of what he had was via a spoon which I cooked for him. Finger food he did eat - I think - was toast / cream cheese or jam sandwiches /fruit - eg chopped cherries, raspberries, nectarines, grapes etc (apple was too hard for him) / raisins / breadsticks and rice cakes / pitta bread / little bits of ham (though he is not keen on this now)/cherry toms cut in half etc. Maybe you could try her with the above, or maybe little bits of pizza(don't know exactly how old she is) if she likes breadsticks you could see if she would like to dip it in humous, Maybe you could cook pasta in a dry sauce which she could eat with her fingers?

Don't worry if she is not interested yet, all babies do things at different times. If she likes mush and eats it I would go with it, but maybe try and cook some home made food for her as well and gradually make it lumpier and lumpier so she gets used to it. Once she is used to this, she may like finger foods abit more as she might be put off by all the chewing if she usually doesn't have to do much.

It took our dd a while to get going on finger food, wilsony - she used to just throw it on the floor. However when we spoke to nursery staff it turned out she was much better at eating it at nursery than at home. She's 13 months now and after about 6 weeks of effort she's almost totally on finger food. Just experiment with stuff off your plates till you find what she will go for, and then once she's used to making the effort you can try again with the other things.
My tip - make sandwiches out of stuff that won't fall out, eg Philly and pate rather than hard cheese or tuna.

Thanks very much, some great ideas - I did try her on bread spread with hummus at the weekend. She took a couple of bites then refused any more (and I think it may have upset her tummy because I got a very nasty runny nappy afterwards) but thanks for the tips re stuff that wont fall out of sandwiches and the pitta breads - I had avoided them because I thought they might be too tough for her to chew - never thought to toast them - how naive am I?!