It took me this long, 31 days give or take, to realize that I never posted a What the Kiddos Ate for July! And honestly, the last 31 days have been a complete blur for me. When did fall happen and why do I now wake up every morning shivering in my summer pajamas and wondering how and why it is so friggin cold outside of my warm bed?? I can’t say I’m jumping into this fall season with open arms, but for the sake of pumpkin themed food, warm soups and oatmeal, I will give it my best try. But I could seriously do without the frosty mornings and need for warm wool socks!

So enough about fall, let’s talk about August. Food wise, August was a fun one in our house as we celebrated Parker’s first birthday (twice), Ellie started full time pre-school (school lunch time!!!) and Parker is now eating the same exact meals as the rest of us!

That means this series is going to change a little.

I am combining all of their meals into Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner categories instead of by what each girl ate. If you look hard enough, you can tell which plates are Ellies and which are Parkers because I am still chopping up Parkers foods into ‘grape’ size pieces. But no matter the size, for the most part, the girls are now eating the same meals, which means the entire family is eating one meal! Super pumped about this!!

With that said, there are still somethings I am still trying to get Parker to eat by herself – yogurt, oatmeal, smoothies and soup. You will see in my upcoming posts how I make this happen, some of the time!:)

Breakfast

Top Left
Meal – Blackberry Greek yogurt with nut granola, peach + blueberry finger salad, green juice (cucumber, apple, pear, lime and a ton of spinach). Verdict – Ellie ate all of the granola and half the yogurt before giving herself a yogurt facial with the rest!! She then continued to eat the finger salad and drink the juice with the facial firmed her skin up.

Top Right
Meal – grain/sugar free chocolate waffles with Greek yogurt, hard boiled egg and farmers market Strawberries. Verdict – to change things up, we had breakfast on our front porch (while wearing our hoodies and socks because it was feeling fall-ish that morning) and Ellie loved the change in scenery! It did take her double the amount of time to eat but she ate it all except 1/2 of one waffle!

Bottom Left
Meal – left over grain/sugar free chocolate cream cheese muffin, peach + blueberry finger salad and avocado chunks. Verdict – oh my, it was a loooooonnng night that night. Ellie was having a night terrors that week (and still gets them), which in turn woke Parker up, so no one got any sleep. I whipped up this breakfast while trying to put a coffee IV into my arm. Parker ate all of it besides 3 pieces of muffin that I sneaked from her;)

Bottom Right
Meal – Oat and Banana pancakes (with butter and maple syrup of course;), blueberry + banana finger salad and a green juice (apple, pear, cucumber, yellow beet, kale, lemon and ginger). Verdict – I got our old juicer out and am loving it! We don’t drink a lot of juice in my house, so any juice, even if it’s green is a big treat! Both of the girls are drinking it up! Ellie downed her glass in no time and then ate half of the pancakes and fruit salad for her breakfast #1 and an hour later she finished it off for breakfast #2.

Lunches

Top Left
Meal – cream cheese + apricot jam sandwich squares, baked pea chips, baby tri-color carrots sticks and dip, peaches and dark chocolate. Verdict – I didn’t give Elle that big of a morning snack because she didn’t eat much breakfast and I knew she would just want to snack all day, so by lunch time she was starving and ate this entire lunch – minus one sandwich she stepped on. She also ate some of Parkers lunch and a banana! I feel like she sometimes hold out on her healthy meals in order to get more snacks later on. Two can play at that game girl!!!

Top Right
Meal – pineapple hummus, tri-colored pepper sticks, purple carrot sticks, multi-grian pita crackers, peach + plum + kiwi finger salad, chocolate surprise and frozen edamame. Verdict – Elle ate everthing but 2 edamame, 4 carrot sticks and 3 orange peppers (guess she wasn’t into orange peppers???) all of which she ate on our way home.

Bottom Left
Meal – whole wheat pita pizza with basil pesto, peach + blueberry finger salad, avocado + lime juice, yogurt covered pretzels and black olives. Verdict – there was 1 pizza crust and a couple avocado pieces left when she was picked up, which she immediately polished off on our walk home.

Bottom Right
Meal – leftover strawberry + avocado + corn + chicken farro salad, double grape + blueberry finger salad, yogurt covered pretzels, carrot sticks with ranch dip and dried cranberries. Verdict – I cracked up with I looked inside after school because everything was gone except the farro! I am sure she ate some farro when it got stuck to a piece of avocado, but clearly she did not want to eat it again today!!

Dinner

Top Left
Meal – rotisserie chicken over herbed rice with garlic + ginger + lime sauce, cabbage salad (purple cabbage, apples, carrots, red onion and walnuts with a maple + mustard dressing) and a lime + mint slushy. Verdict – Ellie devoured the chicken and rice, picked the apples and walnuts out of her salad and drank two servings of slushy!! But the best part of dinner was when Parker demanded that she try the slushy, which of course I let her, and her face was beyond priceless when the cold citrus flavor hit her mouth!! Pucker up baby!!! But she was hooked! She probably drank 1/2 of my glass and was beyond pissed when I won’t give her any more!

Top Middle
Meal – this was actually a lunch but I tossed this in here anyway – pita pizza with chicken + basil, avocado + blueberry finger salad with a splash of lemon and shockingly orange pressed juice made with no oranges (peaches, red plums, apple, pear, yellow beet and carrots). Verdict – Ellie drank all of her juice, 2 pieces of pizza and all of her finger salad. Parker ate almost all of her pizza and avocado, none of her blueberries and just gave me a weird look about the juice.

Top Right
Meal – steak, steamed broccoli with olive oil, farmers market peach + plum finger salad and basil Gouda cheese. Verdict – Parker went crazy over the steak and broccoli – she couldn’t get enough of it (such a dada’s girl, as I don’t care for either of those things). She had some of the cheese and finger salad but since there were leftovers from our morning snack, she wasn’t too into them – no prob, I was happy to help her out with them:)

Middle Left
Meal – grilled steak and chicken with bbq honey mustard dipping sauce, strawberry + kiwi finger salad and corn on the cob. Verdict – Ellie ate ALL of it and then stole my corn on the cob, asked for more steak and then more strawberries! Ellie hadn’t eaten this much in a long time and I think it was because I am cutting out her afternoon snack and she is starving by dinner time! Parker also ate ALL of her dinner except the corn (which I cut off the cob for her) which she tossed on the floor.. 1 kernel at a time.

Middle Middle (HA!)
Meal – taco Tuesday! Slow cooker chicken, feta, spiced black beans (Ellie had this as a taco), figs, red cabbage + cucumber + avocado finger salad. Verdict – we had this meal the night of Parker’s one year appointment where the doctor said ‘don’t worry if Parker starts to slow down on the eating, it is totally normal at this age for them to stop eating so much’ which I totally laughed at because we all know Parker can pack away the food. And low and behold, tonight she barley ate. She had all the feta and sampled the rest.

Middle Right
Meal – chicken enchiladas with cilantro cream sauce and tomatoes, peach + blackberry finger salad and orange + yellow pepper sticks with extra cilantro dip. Verdict – after a solid 10 minute cry because I wouldn’t let Ellie watch youtube on my phone during dinner (mean mommy, I know!!!) she finally calmed down and ate all of her finger salad, half the peppers and enchiladas.

Bottom Left
Meal – crispy tofu + sesame noodles + peppers, cucumber salad and watermelon. Verdict – usually I make this Thai inspired noodle dish with thin rice noodles but serving thin noodles to a little toddler or baby is just mean!!.. so I just used regular noodles so Parker could grab onto them and eat them. The BIG mistake I made was serving watermelon with the rest of the meal instead of just for dessert, because Parker devoured it and then only wanted more of it – like squealing at the top of her lungs asking for more! She finally calmed down enough so she could eat a couple of noodles, peppers and cucumbers, but she was not happy about it!

Bottom Middle
Meal – grilled chicken with peach bbq sauce, strawberries and a summer spinach tortellini pasta salad with olives, zucchini and corn all tossed in a homemade pesto. Verdict – after eating out several times that week, we all needed a healthy dinner. Ellie ate all of the strawberries (first of course), half the chicken (she thought the bbq sauce was soup and spoon fed herself that) and almost all of the pasta salad. She wasn’t sure about the zucchini but after baby ate some, Ellie quickly gobbled hers up – peer pressure at it’s finest!

Bottom Right
Meal – coconut + lime chicken skewers (stick removed before serving:), peanut + coconut dipping sauce, double grape + blueberry finger salad and strawberry + avocado + corn farro salad. Verdict – after demanding to sit on my lap to eat dinner (this never happens) Ellie ate about half of everything. She didn’t want to dip her chicken into the sauce but wanted the sauce drizzled over her chicken like it was on my plate. Of course she HAD to do it and it ended up all over her plate and table.

What are you making this month? I am really into making hubby grill a ton before it gets too cold and I am actually starting to want some thick hearty soups for dinner. There also might be some spinach + artichoke dip happening very soon!!!

Want to see more – follow me on Instagram @babyfoode for daily food pics!