Hungry hungry hippo

So Ms. Ava is the happiest and most easy going baby... unless it's food time! This chick LOVES her milk and if it has been 2 hours and 59 minutes since she last ate she thinks the world is about to end! By now she should be eating every 3.5 hours to 4 hours but my little love is one hungry hungry hippo! before I went back to work I wasn't sure exactly how many oz she was eating but once she started getting bottles we were able to track that she ate 4oz every feeding. Then 4 months came around and all of a sudden she wanted 5-6 oz every feeding and on top of that would ONLY take her milk from the bottle (so double work for me between feedings)! I was having a really hard time keeping up with her demands and really didn't want to switch to formula yet and was hoping this was just a growth spurt. When we went to the pediatrician for her 4 month checkup she didn't seem to concerned with her increase in oz based off her weight and told us that if this wasn't just a "growth spurt" that we might want to start her on brown rice cereal or some form of solid food a little before 5 months. 

So that brings up another issue... "growth spurts!" I feel like babies are ALWAYS going through a growth spurt! I never quite understood the standard growth spurt chart because it seems like Ava always wants more milk! I remember countless nights up with her googling growth spurts. 7 week growth spurt? 13 week growth spurt? 14 week growth spurt?... Anyways, we wanted to wait until around 5/6 months to give her solid food but after her countless demands for milk and my supply dwindling we decided to test it out right before her 5 month birthday. She was showing all the signs of being ready for solid food (sitting well, great head control, watching everything we eat with huge "feed me" eyes, grabbing at our forks/spoons, doubled her birth weight and eating 36+oz in a day) but we still weren't sure she was ready. Well within the first 2 seconds of trying brown rice cereal it was pretty clear she was ready. She actually ate almost every drop! 

She loved the next 2 days of rice cereal but then started being not super interested in it. I know most babies hate rice cereal but it teaches them how to eat real food. So we decided to move on to sweet potatoes! SHE LOVED THEM! She ate 2oz of sweet potato puree, she also then drank 5oz of milk! I am telling you this chick LOVES her milk! 

Here is the step by step of how to make some delicious sweet potato puree. Super easy, super fun and super cheap. 1 potato makes about 4 servings. 

1. Bake, microwave, or boil whole sweet potato 

2. Cut in half and scoop out inside

3. Place sweet potato and 2T of water, breast milk, or formula in the food processer 

4. Puree until there are no lumps

5. Serve to your Sweet One! 

*Place remaining amount in Tupperware and serve as needed throughout the rest of the week. I usually put a little more water or breast milk in each serving and heat up for 8-10 seconds in the microwave