It’s hard to believe, but our little Nolan is already half a year old. We purposefully chose to delay solids with him until 6 months of age, but since he was 26 weeks old yesterday and will be 6 months by date tomorrow, we decided it was time to give his two little teeth something to do. I plan to make all of Nolan’s baby food, and on overwhelming recommendations, we chose mashed avocado for his first food.

The sweet, innocent baby has no idea what is in store for him. He’s thinking, sweet, a cool new toy to play with, a stylish accessory, and my own little chair. When’s my next bottle?

Then Mommy stuck some green mush in his mouth.

After a few attempts, he got tired of the new game pretty quickly and started turning away and gluing his lips together. A new persnickety palate in the making… (That, by the way, is something I dearly want to avoid. Having struggled with being an exquisitely picky eater all my life, I want to encourage Nolan, so far as I can, to be a healthy, adventurous eater. Hopefully, that will also mean forcing myself to overcome certain aversions by way of example.)

But maybe it isn’t so bad… (This is a classic Nolan face, by the way. He slides his jaw side to side like Bill Murray in Caddyshack.)

I think we ended on a good note. This is just practice food anyway. I mashed up half the avocado with a drop of lemon juice and froze it in teaspoon-sized blobs for our next attempts. I’ve got bananas and brown rice (for homemade cereal), and want to make some homemade applesauce and pears while they’re in season. Wish us luck, and any suggestions would be appreciated.