Master negotiator, and 18 month update

So Jocelyn is what I would call a particular eater. She is not picky, per se, because she likes a lot of things. But she wants what she wants when she wants it. For example, one day she will love pieces of grilled chicken that she can dip into barbecue sauce. The next day it might as well be poison. One week it's all grapes, all the time, the next she'd rather have pears.

But she has demonstrated that she is open to negotiation. It's tricky to get the terms of the negotiation correct, but she will eventually clue you in to what she is willing to eat an undesirable food for.

Today, for example, she was willing to eat pieces of her leftover hamburger and bits of pork (all dipped in ketchup, of course) for sips of Gatorade. At lunch today, it was peanut butter and apricot sandwich wedges for more applesauce (and when we did reward her with more applesauce, she said "applesauce," which was awesome). Milk is also a common drink for her to desire and she is usually willing to eat things for more of it. The funny part is that it's mostly a win-win - she is usually negotiating for things we are perfectly happy for her to eat / drink. It's funny.

Jocelyn is a big dipper. There are some things that she won't eat without something to dip it in (any sort of meat, for example, and pancakes at home [probably because I make them whole wheat and sweeten with fruit instead of sugar]). She will point to the compartment of her dish where the dip goes and yell "more" until she gets the ketchup / barbecue sauce / pancake syrup / etc. she is looking for. Recently, though, she figured out that if she likes the dip so much better than the food she is dipping, why waste the precious tummy space on the food? I caught her eating her barbecue sauce with her spork! And, of course, I had the absolute wrong reaction - I cracked up laughing! So that probably made the message of 'hey - don't do that' a bit confusing. But I couldn't help it, it was really funny. I tried to get around it by not giving her a spork next time (even though she needs practice with spoons and sporks, and will eventually graduate to forks). But she then used the dipper as a spoon - took some bread and dipped it into ketchup and then licked the ketchup off of it, and dipped it again! Silly baby!

In addition to saying 'applesauce', Jocelyn has a few more new words. She's gotten really good at bye, and even says buh-bye sometimes. Recently she has taken to saying NO, but mosty to her "Don't Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus" book (which is appropriate). She can also say yes. She has been saying more for a while now, but thanks to day care, she also signs it. Which is awesome. I need to figure out which other signs she has learned (I know it's please, thank you and something else, but I don't know how the signs go) so I can practice them with her at home. I know she has others, but I can't think of them right now. Some are old and just coming back - ball, bath, baby (which all sound the same right now).

She had her 18 month appointment, and is developing great! She's a few months ahead of schedule in just about everything! Usually if the physical moves fast (walking, running, climbing, fine motor skills, etc.), then the talking / intellectual comes more slowly, and vice versa. But not my girl! She's advanced in both areas :-). That's really good for a first child, since she has no role models. I can only imagine that Pecan will move even faster. But if he doesn't, that's fine.

I am concerned about one thing, that I will have to ask the doctor about next time. Because Jocelyn is so, well, active, I didn't get to look at her growth sheet the nurse gave me while waiting for the doctor to come in. Or else I would have asked about it then. Jocelyn is still 90% for head circumference, and 75% for height (a bit lower than in the past, but only a bit), but now she is only 6% for weight! She used to be upwards of 90%! She basically hasn't gained any weight since her first birthday. She gained a few lbs, but then lost them while she was sick. And 4 weeks of being sick meant about 2-3 lbs lost, which is significant for somebody her size! We did ask about the weight loss, and the doctor didn't seem concerned. We talked about her eating, and that she does eat really well, and that we basically let her eat as much as she wants of healthy foods. She's still on full fat milk and mostly on full fat yogurt (YoBaby is full fat, YoToddler is low fat, and I gave up on mixing home-made fruit purees with plain yogurt at home, because I wound up throwing away half a tub of yogurt every 2 weeks).

She's also slightly low in iron. She was probably half a point lower than the cut-off, so we need to start giving her iron. The instructions from the doctor do not line up with the instructions on the box, so I need to call tomorrow to clarify. It took a few days for the iron to come in on a special order, and I finally got it this evening, so it was too late to do much with it. I figure that the doctor probably gave the right dosage, but there were some 3 versions of the medicine that the doctor could have ordered, so I just want to make sure. Too much iron is poisonous. In the mean time, we are trying to increase her iron-rich foods - more cereals, meats, peanut butter and apricots. Although, other than meats (which she just isn't too crazy about most of the time), she does eat a fair amount of the other foods. So I don't know.

She's a cutie-patootie. I can write about her all night. I won't. Pecan needs a blog post, too :-P.