Something happened that day at brunch. A switched flipped in Babystar’s brain or on her palette or somewhere underneath her tongue and she is SO MUCH DONE with purees and only wants to eat real food. Specifically, whatever mama is eating.
This is how she has had a bite of ice cream sandwich. (Ok, three bites.) Whoops.
I don’t even bother with separate plates anymore. Well, except at dinner when everyone is home. Breakfast and lunch and elevensies and brunch and snacks and freaking mid-morning tea time are all shared-plate-buffet-style. Y’all. I’ve been eating a lot of strawberries and watermelon.
A Day of Food with Babystar – Home All Day
- Cheerios with Almond/Coconut milk: $0.35
- Clementines: $0.66
- Green beans: $0.02 (she basically licked two of them)
- Sweet potatoes (puree!): $0.50
- Strawberries: $0.45
- Spanakopita: $0.75
- Watermelon: $0.73
- Pasta with tomato sauce: $0.53
- Gerber Arrowroot cookies: $0.18
A Day of Food with Babystar – Lunch Out
- Cheerios with Almond/Coconut milk: $0.35
- Nectarine: $2.36
- Dry Cheerios (shhh!): $0.15
- Fried rice: $3
- Spring roll: $1
- Dry Cheerios (I know, I know.): $0.15
- Grilled mozzarella and pepperoni sandwich: $0.60
- Strawberries: $0.45
- Applesauce (some kind of apple blend puree): $1.35
A Day of Food with Babystar – Dinner out
- Egg: $0.33
- Toast: $0.14
- Clementine: $0.33
- Watermelon: $1.26
- Pizza (yep. so much pizza.): $2.24
So Babystar is mostly eating whatever I eat, and I am mostly trying to eat healthy so that she will eat healthy. She still wants milk all the time, too. I guess this is kind of working for now but I doubt it will work forever. How do you feed your toddler? Do you have a schedule? Do you make anything ahead? I think I better get something going soon or she will be stealing my food and refusing everything else forever.
(So I took the average of the three random days to get $5.96. I’m using that number for each day in June since I last took note on the eleventh. I may need a different system soon but I guess this works for now.)
RAISING BABYSTAR: $10,540.58
BabyCostsMoney 
I’m impressed that you figured out the cost of these things!
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It was horrible LOL. I def need a new way to keep track of how much I’m spending on her food.
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I am totally stalking your blog because I love money and budgeting and allllllmost did this same thing with mine but I was not about to calculate the cost of every little piece of food. So thanks for being less lazy than me.
We skipped the purees altogether. Mine is now 8.5 months, we started when he was was 7 months. I do spoon feed him some things (and when we’re out, because it’s ok to shriek like a banshee and throw watermelon at home, but not at a restaurant) but for the most part I just give him appropriate versions of what we eat. It was a lot of tossing overboard in the beginning, getting to be less, and I was worried about the money I was “wasting”, but I know that if he rejects a sliver of a $3 watermelon, that’s minuscule compared to how much I could be tossing in the form of premade baby foods. Plus, like you said, it has forced me to try and make healthier foods. It’s easy to just let him have bits of our dinner. It’s way more fun for him. I daresay it’s better for him. And now I have an 8 month old that eats avocados and hummus and pesto and mangos and peaches like a mad man.
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First of all, thank you for reading! I love stalkers! (The good kind, obvs.)
Second, I wish I loved budgeting. I kind of hate it which is what prompted me to do this. I have definitely become way more aware of where we are spending money in the last year. I should do this with everything in my life but nah. LOL.
As to the food, YES. I love that I have to model healthier eating. I will do a lot of things for Babystar that I wouldn’t do for myself. That’s true for most all parents, I imagine. And that baby will CRUSH a nectarine, fistful at a time. (I cut it into pieces for her but she is not all about my recommended bite size.)
I love that she loves real food. I think of all the food on the floor as an investment. 🙂
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