High Chairs for Babies and Children + Accessories High chairs has always been one of those essential baby furniture items that really helps a mom out at feeding time. High chairs also help make the little one feel more part of the family when he can sit around the table along with everyone else. You are using an older browser version. Please use a supported version for the best MSN experience.I am a neat freak. So feeding #babyjake causes me mild (like 7 out of 10) anxiety. It’s a filthy ritual. And it happens three times a day. So trust me when I say this: you want this chair. There are no little nooks or crannies in which food can hide. There’s no fabric that can get soiled with salmon (there is an option of a back-rest cushion but we never use ours).It’s so freaking easy to wipe clean. And for those mommies who don’t know this – I am about to revolutionise your world: there is a local company called Nevada Furniture that imports ANY Ikea products your heart desires.
Remember, you need to buy the tray separately. The only critique I have (and it breaks my heart to say a single negative word against my precious Antilop): but the height of the chair is a bit on the lowish side. But I still wouldn’t swap it for anything else (except maybe a Range Rover). Now, some old-schoolers may recommend a high chair that has full recline functionality if baby isn’t yet able to sit in the upright seated high-chair position. But that’s just dumb. Rather purchase one of these. Rather pricey for something that you’re really only going to use for a few months, but you’re going be saving so much by buying an Antilop that it’s worth it (or try to get your hands on a second-hand one – try Mom’s List). It comes in aqua, magenta or charcoal. You could also use the Bumbo version of this – although I am not the biggest fan. #babyjake’s legs (which really aren’t that chubs) get sandwiched into the Bumbo and we have to use the Jaws of Life to pry him out.
But it, too, will do the trick. Just remember not to leave baby seated in the chair for too long, as these types of rubber moulded chairs have gotten quite a bit of flack for being bad for development. But used in moderation, it’s a seriously nifty little piece for those first feeds. Without the freezer, #babyjake would quite plausibly starve to death. The only way to turn your kitchen into a mini production line of frozen baby food is by investing in the right ice cube trays. I traversed the land in search of the perfect ice tray. The cubes had to be deep enough to store enough food. They needed to have lids. They needed to be BPA free (because the food will be hot when you scoop it in, and you don’t want plastic poison seeping into your peas). Once your food is frozen, you will pop out the little cubes and transfer them into systematic, colour-coded, date-stamped zip lock bags. (I’ll do a post on freezing with more efficiency than Elsa in Frozen). My freezer literally resembles a filing cabinet.
And then each morning, we go shopping in the freezer and hand pick a merry selection of cubes for the day. From my experience, you need between six and eight trays. The perfect starter food for introducing solids, rice cereal is gentle on the tummy, bland and easy to prepare. Now, I am in no way a tree-hugging-vegan-organic-crop-growing-mother-of-the-earth, and my lifestyle contains enough radiation, wifi and preservatives to nuke a small country, but I just don’t understand why anyone would opt for a commercial baby cereal that isn’t made up of 100% plain ingredients. Come on, how you can you actually purchase a baby cereal that lists maltodextrin as an ingredient?! So I am a huge fan of the Olli Organic plain rice cereal that literally contains nothing other than 100% organic dried brown rice. Read the labels mommies! This little tool will become your best friend. I randomly found this in the aisles of Pick n Pay, and subsequently went back to buy a second one just to be safe.
I have pureed everything and anything from chicken to kale. Way easier than a blender, this little magic stick will keep dirty dishes to a minimum, blitzing the butternut in no time. And the price is really reasonable. It’s compulsory that you own one. These little food pots are so lovely for so many reasons. They are BPA free. And they come in blue or pink, which is a nifty bonus for kosher moms. But the best part is their size – they hold the perfect portion. One of the trickiest parts of solids is knowing how much your baby should be eating, and while there is no standard rule, these pots hold a good amount of food. I am still using these little spoons (#babyjake is now nine months). They’re also available in pink or blue – again for the kosher mommies. I’ve tried a couple of baby spoons and, believe it or not, a spoon is not just a spoon. The amount of mess that one tiny human manages to generate from a single meal the size of a matchbox is really quite baffling.
I find the mess to be so extensive that I sometimes consider throwing the baby out with the bath water. Reality check, butternut stains. And it will destroy your perfect little bandana bibs. I have tried PVC wipeable bibs, including those Full-Body-Bib-Space-Suits, yet these little paper bibs from Pigeon’s seem to be the only ones to keep the mess (relatively) at bay. Must be Pigeons, I have tried other brands that don’t work as well. So we owned this steamer long before #babyjake came along, and it’s now the hero of our kitchen. You will be steaming industrial quantities of vegetables to add to your freezer inventory. So you need a steamer that can handle the load. Every six to eight weeks, we have a marathon cook-off, where we steam and puree en masse. The steamer’s little motor is put to work for a good few hours, and it’s never let me down. It’s also easy(ish) to clean. Get one with 3 tiers. You absolutely cannot survive solids without one. Ok, so I admit that the only reason I own this is because I bought it on a ridiculously marked-down sale.
So while this isn’t an essential piece of machinery, it’s a really nifty nice-to-have. It’s great for cooking small quantities during the early days. Pop in a couple of pieces of butternut, switch it on, steam and puree. There are a couple of these dual steamer / blenders on the market, i.e. the Baby Bullet or the Philips Avent Wasabi (but that retails for around R2 000-R3 000) – and I really don’t recommend these as they can’t do large quantities at once. Though, if you’re a gadget-a-holic and want a dual steamer/blender, the Salton does the trick just fine. Remember, you can’t use this to cook bulk quantities, but it’s great for getting started. So, there you have it. The quintessential survival tools for solids. (Of course, back in the good old days when I was #babyjake’s age, my mom managed just fine with nothing but a pot and a fork, but that’s beside the point.) We want to know more about you Welcome to the Living and Loving online community! Please tell us more about yourself so we can ensure we’re creating content that meets your needs.