My son will be 1 in 1 week and has been taking solid foods very well since 3 1/2 mos old. He is 22 lbs and in the 95%-ile for height and weight, walking since 9 months old and very active. I am hoping someone has advice. DS seems to be having some solid food issues. He is up to about 6 oz of pureed foods per meal, 3X per day and one snack, plus 4 bottles of formula 6 to 7 oz each. I usually give him stage 3 food in jars, yoghurts with cereal or pureed/ mashed fruits and veggies with pastina and fish or finely shredded meat mixed in. For the last few weeks, I've been mixing table food into his purees to gradually increase the texture. One issue is he gags sometimes on the carrot or pasta pieces in the Stage 3 jars, which are pretty soft. It's made me a little wary of giving him only "table" food which I presume will be less processed and therefore firmer than that in the jars. He's thrown up 3 times in the last month from gagging. Not a lot, I know, but scary when it happened anyway. Seems to me he just swallows anything by spoon, without chewing.

Just to confuse the heck out of me on the other hand, he chows down fairly easily self feeding well on firm or crispy finger foods- crackers, baby cookies, puffs, freeze dried fruit, even the occasional whole grain chip when I'm eating them, yet he REFUSES to eat soft finger foods AT ALL. I've tried peas, pieces of banana, strawberries, cheese, pasta, vegetables.....no luck. All he does is squeeze them very hard, then smear them all over the table. I even tried rolling small banana chunks in crushed Oatios thinking the dry texture would encourage him to eat it. No success. He won't even let me put the soft chunks in his mouth. I'm so frustrated that he seems only to want to eat "by hand" what I think are empty calories. You would think soft things would be easier for him to eat on his own and he certainly knows how to chew, he just won't chew when being spoon fed, and won't put soft finger food into his mouth.

To make it worse, for the last two days, he's refused to be fed by spoon, taking only his formula and finger foods, but again, only the dry, firm kinds, which obviously lack the best nutrition. I'm hoping the nanny will have better luck today while I'm at work but if not, I'm thinking he may be more interested in self feeding rather than being fed. Problem is I am not sure how to get him to eat more nutritious finger foods like vegs and fruit, and also how to transition to more "big people" food. I would really love any advice/tips anyone might have.