When Captain Jelly Belly was about 8 months old, I took him to the mall for a walk, because that’s what old people and stay-at-home moms call a rockin’ good time in this town. I met two of my girlfriends there, both of whom had a baby boy a couple of months older than the Captain.

At the time we were having some difficulty getting the Captain to eat solids. Later we found out that it was due to his allergies — some of the food we were giving him was making him feel sick, and it’s no wonder he grew to be distrustful of the little spoonfuls of potential nausea we were trying to get him to put in his mouth. One of my two girlfriends that day was having similar problems, also due, it turned out, to food allergies.

The third friend, though, had a real eater on her hands. She pulled out a jar of peas she’d brought for snack, and man, she could not spoon it in fast enough. Her son sucked through that puppy in less than five minutes and then was ready for a bottle of formula as a chaser. The whole time she was feeding him, my friend said stuff like, “This is incredible! Look at him eat! Can you believe this?” And my other friend and I exchanged looks that said, “No, actually we cannot believe it. Is your baby actually human? Or is is just that we are the worst mothers ever?”

Later, Gal Smiley’s introduction to solids was also not quite the joyous buffet I’d seen at the mall. She doesn’t have any food allergies, but she was a very tiny baby, still is around the 0% percentile for height and weight. We predict she’ll be in her car seat until at least 13 years old, poor kid. So when it came to solid food, she was a dainty eater; a typical meal was a teaspoon or so of food. I had this schedule of feeding that suggested that a 6-month-old would be eating “2-4 Tablespoons” of cereal or vegetables three times a day, and I used to just laugh and laugh at it like it was a Canadian game show. Totally Ludacris! Redikulus! And other famous rappers!

Now we have the Wee One, and I seriously do not know what to do with her. She’s an eater! Who would have thought it?

It’s been a couple of weeks now that she has been on solids and man, does she ever love it. When it’s mealtime, she shakes with excitement and squeals with delight when we present her with her own spoon. She almost always finishes all her food, and last night, she ate a whole half-jar of sweet potatoes and then cried because I couldn’t scrape any more out of the bowl. And she loves everything, too, it’s always, “Mother, have you tried this squash? Because it’s divine! So good it’s Ridikulus!” I can’t wait until we get around to chocolate ice cream. It’s gonna blow her mind.

So I guess I just…keep letting her eat. Lots. It just seems to easy. Thank goodness we finally won the baby eating lottery!