Would you consider board books an appetizer?
Is there some sort of vitamin or mineral missing from my son’s diet that causes him to want to eat every. single. paper product in sight? Is this some form of Pica I’m unaware of? Should I be supplementing his diet with fiber….tree pulp?? Maybe I missed the tree pulp section on WholesomeBabyFood.com. I get the wanting to put things in his mouth out of curiosity. I get wanting to bite on things to relieve teething pain. I do not get him biting off chunks of board books and corners of junk mail daily in an all out attempt to chew and digest it. I feed the kid – well. Mangoes, squash, edamame, yogurt…it’s not a boring or bland diet. Perhaps that’s what he’s craving, though. Maybe his mouth waters at the thought of taking a big juicy bite out of a tasty Sandra Boynton book. Snugglepuppy is thisclose to becoming unreadable.
A trip to the local mega evil mart today led us down the toy aisle. I saw him glance over at one of the elentybillion types of creepy Elmo, and a big smile spread across his face. I picked it up and pressed his tummy. “Hug Elmo!” it said (at really quite an alarming volume). Kendall reached out for it while making this sort of noise of joy that sounds like he’s coughing up a hairball (but I assure you there is no hairball to come, it’s just his happy noise, oddly enough), his eyes got bigger and bigger. For a second, it was adorable to see him light up that way. I was even thinking to myself, “Damn. He loves the thing. I could get it and call it a Valentine’s gift, I guess. I wonder if there is a volume control.” As his sausage fingers drew near, I anticipated he would try to pet Elmo or squeeze him, or even draw him close and give him a kiss. No. The kid reached straight for the paper tag on Elmo’s hand that said “Squeeze my belly!” and tried to rip it off and shove it in his mouth. “Well,” I thought, “that settles that. I’m not paying $18 for a paper tag attached to a borderline annoying licensed character.” He cried as I put Elmo back on the shelf, but stopped when I gave him the box of Mum Mums to chew on.
Kendall is 9 months, 1 week and 4 days old
Filed Under: Post Incubation
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T, too! I swear she instantly tries to eat any kind of paper product.
Oh my goodness!! Both of my kids have had a love for eating paper. I have no idea why they just do.
Yes, yes. I did not know my DS had a love for board books until I went to get him out of his car seat after a 5 minute drive and half of the cover was gone. Oops!
We don’t read non-board books to C anymore. She has ripped, licked, and eaten too many paper pages. At least the board books are a little bit harder to destroy.
You are hilarious! I can’t wait to be a funny mommy like you.
Thanks, Talia! And good luck with your blogging experiment. I feel the opposite. Totally comfortable with blogging, but Twitter has me a little confused
I caught my 8 month old baby eating magazine paper and I’m just worried that it might harm him. Can any one tell me if i have anything to worry about?
My son is 2 1/2 & has not yet outgrown the paper eating. Although I sometimes wonder is he just really enjoys my reaction to it more than the taste. He thinks it’s so funny. Sandra Boynton board books were a favorite at our house too.