Feeding with Love and Good Sense: The First 2 Years
Copyright © 2014 by Ellyn Satter
Kelcy Press
4226 Mandan Crescent, Suite 57
Madison, WI 53711-3062
877 844 0857
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying and recording or by any information storage and retrieval, without permission in writing from Ellyn Satter.
ISBN 9780-9671189-6-3
Publisher’s Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Feeding with Love and Good Sense: The First Two Years 1. Parenting. Infants and toddlers. 2. Feeding. 3. The family and family meals. 4. Children. Child development.
Developmental editor, Nancy Pekar
Kelcy Press books are available at special discounts for bulk purchases. For more information, contact Kelcy Press.
Distributed by
Ellyn Satter Institute
608-318-1600
Feeding with Love and Good Sense: The First 2 Years
Ellyn Satter is the go-to authority about raising healthy children who are a joy to feed. In this booklet, the second in the Feeding with Love and Good Sense series, Satter advises you about how to feed your child in words and pictures, and demonstrates why to do it with feeding stories.
Ellyn Satter is a Registered Dietitian Nutritionist and Family Therapist. Says Satter, “This booklet and the materials below are based on my decades-long adventures in feeding and eating with parents, children, families, adults, and the caring professionals who work with them.”
Child of Mine: Feeding with Love and Good Sense: A warm, supportive, and entertaining book about wise, loving, and tuned-in feeding. Helps you understand your child and feed well from birth through preschool.
Secrets of Feeding a Healthy Family: How to Eat, How to Raise Good Eaters, How to Cook: When the joy goes out of eating, nutrition suffers. The secret of raising a healthy eater is to love good food, enjoy eating, and teach your child to do the same.
Your Child’s Weight: Helping Without Harming: If you are determined to have a slim child, this is not the book for you. On the other hand, if you are willing to do an excellent job with feeding and to let your child grow up with the body that is right for him or her, read on.
Ellyn Satter’s Feeding with Love and Good Sense II Videos: Close-up, fascinating footage of real parents and real children in their homes in actual feeding situations. Shows what works and what doesn’t with feeding.
Feeding with Love and Good Sense: The First Two Years: This brief, beautiful, engaging booklet gets today’s busy parents off to a good and authoritative start with feeding.
www.ellynsatterinstitute.org: Loads of free stuff about how to feed, how to eat, parents’ success stories, and articles. Shopping for Ellyn Satter’s books, other booklets in this series
Table of Contents
1. Where you are going with feeding
Think of your child as a future toddler. By 8 to 18 months, your tiny baby will be a good eater and ready to join in when you have family-friendly meals.
2. Follow the division of responsibility
To raise a good eater, do your jobs with feeding and parenting, then trust your child to do her jobs with eating, moving, and growing.
3. Understand your child’s development and temperament
Being able to recognize stages in development and understand temperament lets you trust and enjoy your child and parent in the best way.
4. How to feed your newborn and infant
Your baby eats best and feels best about you—and about eating—when you pay attention to her and do what she wants.
5. How to feed your older baby and toddler
Start and progress solid foods based on what your baby can do, not how old he is. Rules about when and what to feed make you ignore your baby and doubt your judgment.
6. What to feed your child: step by step
Your child might progress from starting solids to joining in with family meals in a couple of months, or it may take a year or more. Go as fast or as slowly as is right for her.
7. Solve feeding problems
To correct feeding problems, be sure to do your jobs and just as sure to refrain from trying to do your child’s jobs. Focus on the quality of feeding rather than the quantity your child eats.
8. What you have learned
Feeding is parenting in all ways. You have to do your jobs, but then you have to let go. Throughout the growing-up years, maintain a division of responsibility in feeding.
1. Where you are going with feeding
Your child’s learning to be a good eater starts at birth. At each step along the way, this booklet addresses your part in his learning—starting with breast- or formula-feeding, going through the steps to learn to eat grown-up food, and joining in with family meals. Step by step, your child learns to eat the food you eat and feel about eating the way you do.
A good eater is a competent eater.