What ruins an appetite faster than watching a toddler eat?
Dining with my son didn’t use to be this messy. Back when he was still an infant, we fed him with a spoon and kept things relatively neat. However, he as soon as he figured out how to use his hands, he demanded a little more control during his feeding process. This began with him eating with his hands and has progressed to him using toddler-sized utensils. More often than not, food which starts out on the utensil ends up anywhere but his mouth. Dinnertime has progressed from a peaceful time to gather to one big wet, sticky, icky, splattery meal after another.
I thought I’d seen it all until tonight.
My wife and I sat in the dining room, eating chicken fried rice (my first attempt at that meal, which turned out surprisingly unburned). E (my son) ate white sticky rice, peas, scrambled egg and pears. And when I say ate, I of course mean – put some food in his mouth and then dutifully spread the rest across his high chair tray in random patterns. He also managed to get food on his face, arms, hands, down the front of his shirt and in the high chair seat. I was not looking forward to cleaning the mess.
As dinner was winding down, my wife and I were talking about our days when she paused and then asked, “Do you hear something?”
Sure enough, I heard what sounded like running water.
I began looking around for the source and saw a puddle forming under my son’s high chair.
I looked up to see if perhaps his tray or bottle was leaking. No. The water was coming from the bottom of the high chair. It was coming from him! He had peed through his diaper and it was now running through the highchair and onto the carpet below. I’ve never seen him soak through a diaper except at bedtime (at which time we use diaper doublers – Best. Invention. Ever.), so I was surprised. My wife rushed him straight to the bathtub while I disassembled the high chair and cleaned away urine soaked debris.
So, what’s a parent to do when meal time becomes a precursor to an hour and half of cleanup time?
Well, I’ve come up with a few ideas.
The eating bubble.
Toddlers see food as multipurpose. When they’re full, leftovers make for great missiles. Whether it be peas, potatoes, pears or Cheerio’s, all are fun to toss at mommy, daddy or the wall. If food throwing is ever a sporting event, my son has one hell of an exciting future ahead of him. However, cleaning food off of the carpets, walls, table, ourselves and our toddler can be a time consuming chore. Not any longer with the toddler eating bubble! Now, baby and the family can eat together without fear of flung foods or disastrous spills. Baby dines within a ‘bubble’ of vinyl which contains the mess while still allowing for family interaction.
What you will need: a highchair, a large waterproof tarp, arc welding equipment, aluminum rods, a shower curtain and hooks.
Directions: Step 1: Lay tarp on the ground.
Step 2: Place highchair in center of tarp.
Step 3: Use arc welding equipment to fashion aluminum circle hanger which will fasten to the back of the highchair.
Step 4: Hang curtain around highchair and encircle toddler. (make sure there is plenty of open space for circulation above the toddler. Enjoy meal.
The toddler-proof dining room.
With just a bit of plumbing and construction knowledge, a dining room can be made into a toddler-proof dining room. With tiled floors and walls, a floor drain and two hoses, cleanup is a cinch!
What you will need: industrial strength waterproof tile (like used in high traffic restaurants), wall tile, large floor drain, hammer, chisel, concrete, drain pipe, drain trap, construction of drain trenches, two hose bibs, two hoses (spray nozzles optional).
Directions: Step 1: Using chisel, break concrete to install drain… oh, who am I kidding. Just hire a plumber.
Feed your child in the bathtub.
The last step is probably the quickest to implement, though a bit unconventional. Place your child in the tub, feed them their meal. Simple as that. Cleaning up is a whole lot easier when all you have to do is turn on the shower and wash the mess away. The only downside to this option is that it might make family dining a bit harder, unless you are one of those who are wealthy enough to have bathrooms as large as my dining room – in which case, how about a donation to your favorite blogger?
What you will need: a bathtub, food, a child.
Directions: Place child in bathtub, feed child food, turn on water, wash mess away.
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(photo credits: E ‘s first taste of potatoes – Aug. 9, 2008: BloggerDad, The Eating Bubble – art by BloggerDad, modified version of welding photo – Flickr)
I vote for the bubble. Where can I get one?
Mine are now at post grad stage but I had to laugh. Come from In a Pickle.
Ah, yes. Child number four is at this stage too. That’s not her name btw. She will NOT be fed by her parents. She eats one, she chucks one, she eats one, she drops one, she eats one, she smears hair with one, she eats one, she smears parent with one. She’s a very sharing child.
Our dining table is on a wipe clean floor. Tee hee hee.
I don’t even have her use bibs anymore, it’s pointless. It’s just one more thing to wash.
BloggerDad, LMAO at your solutions, so very practical and attractive, I can’t understand why you’re not a millionaire already.
Dave Fowlers last blog post..Getting Into And Out Of A Pickle
Oh I know what you are talking about. I so need to do that toddle proof dining room. You have seen the mess of one toddler, now imagine that plus 3 and you have my life. Great isn’t it?
I’ve actually done the feeding in the bathtub one… LOL!
The other practical solution I came up with was buying the high chair with the largest tray I could find. It was a lot harder for them to drop stuff over the side if their little arms couldn’t reach over the end. Of course, this did not stop the throwing (once they figured out that one).
GreenJellos last blog post..Wordless Wednesday
or you could do what I do and never feed them . . . kidding kidding!
Taras last blog post..Wordless Wednesday: Black Boxes
I think bathtub dining could catch on (remember when Kramer started cooking in the tub).
I like your “literally tens of others.” Very funny.
Hahahahah….ahem.
I find keeping a dust-buster handy is worthwhile. At five, the Evil Genius has better coordination than when he first started controlling his food ingress, but he still misses…and then there are the endless crumbs…Cheez-Its, potato chips, bread, cereal – if it can make a crumb, he manages to get it everywhere.
No kidding, I have to vacuum the furniture before anyone can sit down, or they end up looking like a cross between modern art and a bird feeder.
Thankfully, I never had to deal with the nappy-blowout at mealtime…but now he’s out of nappies, the potetial eruptions are all the more terrifying!
I’m told they get neater by the second decade.
Shade and Sweetwater,
K
Kyddryns last blog post..Dam, Trees
Blogger Dad, I am disappointed in you. You forgot the most important one…blend up all the food to a liquid consistency, pour into spill proof sippy cup, hand to toddler, stand back and watch them try to make a mess. Now who doesn’t have a blender, some water and a sippy cup already? As the toddler advance, keep the same method, but introduce straws and open top cups.
The thought of Thanksgiving dinner all blended together into one puddle of turcrantatoll (turkey cranberry potato roll) just sounds yummy doesn’t it? Mmmm, makes me want seconds!
Sals last blog post..2 Week Break
Tim – I’m working on the patent now. Probably shoulda’ done that BEFORE I posted the plans online. Doh!
Virtual Voyage – Welcome, thanks for checking out the blog! Glad to provide a laugh.
Dave – LOL, I like the line about number four not being her real name and the sharing child line, too! Yeah, we gave up on bibs. We’re more likely to just take his shirt off if we know it will be a messy meal. As for me not being a millionaire, yeah – that’s just not right!
Jen – I would cry morning, noon, and night if I had three (and two at the toddler stage). I think my blog would be nothing but me griping. It would either be the least read blog on the web, or hysterically funny and popular among those also buried with children.
GreenJello – Welcome, thanks for checking out the blog! So, you’ve DONE the bathtub feedings? Wow, I guess my ideas aren’t so far fetched! We got a larger trayed high chair, too. The problem with the GIANT tray though is that it’s so damned hard to clean! I don’t want to use chemical cleaners since E eats off the tray directly half the time. So, I usually wind up cleaning it … in the bathtub.
Tara – If I didn’t feed him, he would likely eat the cats. Hmm, maybe that’s two problems solved
Writer Dad – I’ll bet some product maker is reading this now and pitching a line of bathtub-related dining ware to some boardroom full of wide eyed suits. As for the tens of others… sad but true.
Kyddryn – LOL, that is hysterical “a cross between modern art and a bird feeder”! Awesome. Yeah, we do the dustbuster thing, too. Unfortunately, I didn’t realize you should empty the dustbuster out after using it on food. Let’s just say I needed a dustbuster (and several other cleaning agents) to clean my dustbuster. yuck!
A bathrub, I’ll have to remember that one dude. And I was begginning to get fedup with wiping my four months old chin from milk oozing from the fast flow bottle. I ain’t seen nothing yet….
Surfer Jays last blog post..
I guess I must be one of the lucky parents to have a child who loves food so much, he can’t bear to see it anywhere but inside his tummy.
Matthew Drydens last blog post..My Meme(me?)
Surfer Jay – Thanks for stopping by! Yeah, the milk will be the LEAST of your worries!
Matthew – It must be nice! My son loves food too. I think he only throws it because he wants to eat it at a later time (if we miss picking it up during cleanup).
You can add another one that is very handy for the arm-throwers in your family ~ the patterned wall.
Paint your dining room wall with patterns, in random intervals which will hide the food smears. Just don’t forget to wash the walls at least once a week!
I love your post. Our last child is almost 1 1/2 years old, and he still throws food, drink, plates, bowls and utensils across our huge dining room table when he is done eating. We only give him plastic things, or else it’ll be an emergency run visit for another one of our children.
For any of our children’s stages, we always repeat the mantra: “It will end. It will end. It will end. By the time they are 16 years old, we’ll have a whole new set of problems. This is nothing. It will end.”
Well, you get the picture.
Blogger Dad, did you ever think of sewing the arms of your son’s shirts onto the body the shirt. Only up to the elbow though. That way he could still reach his food and get it in his mouth, but he wouldn’t be able to throw it so far.
Rosie – thanks for stopping by. Perhaps I will paint the wall in a random splotchy look so any new food that hits the walls will become part of the artwork. Of course, the smell might get bad after a while.
As for mantra’s, mine is, “please take a nap, please take a nap, please take a nap” sometimes only an hour after my son woke up.
Dave – So, in other words, a baby straight jacket? Man, you must’ve been one badass cop, Dave! Putting babies in straight jackets!
Well when you say it like that it doesn’t sound so great.
I’ll tell you what. YOU make them, and I’LL do the marketting.
Hehehehe.
Dave Fowlers last blog post..Women’s Work: The Hardest Work I’ve Ever Done
And I’ll do it with just one ‘t’.
Dave Fowlers last blog post..Women’s Work: The Hardest Work I’ve Ever Done
I can’t believe everyone has missed the obvious answer…. BUY A DOG!!!
They eat everything that gets hurled at them and lick the floor clean afterwards. If they are big enough they can even lick the high chair clean for you!!! No mess, no fuss….
These ideas are wonderful. The bubble could definitely work and actually reminds me of Ralph Macchio’s halloween costume in the original Karate Kid. I fear that the toddler might actually be more interested in reaching out from the curtain than eating therefore making an even bigger mess. Maybe the bathtub idea is the best way to go
.-= Michael Firstman@ Buy Mig Welder´s last blog ..Ingersoll Rand 80 – 120 Gallon Rotary Screw Air Compressor =-.