Messy, messy.

I am soooo not a fan of messes.

I'm just not. A high school friend posted a picture on Facebook the other day of her boys playing outside in a giant mud puddle - covered head to toe in it - and I almost had a panic attack just looking at it. The husband's not cool with messiness either, so you can imagine how much cringing happens around our dinner table while our little munchkins eat.

Unfortunately, messiness comes with learning how to feed yourself. Spaghetti, bananas, yogurt - some things are worse than others. Trying to figure out how to eat with a spoon is no easy task when you're not even one. So needless to say, all kinds of messes are starting to be made around here while our little buddy is figuring it all out.

Joe just loves to have access to a spoon! He doesn't even care to really get food from it; he just likes to be able to hold it and chew on it. This was only the 2nd time that I gave him a chance to try to feed himself. Oatmeal is the perfect food to help teach kids how to use a spoon because it's thick enough to stay on the spoon a really long time when they flip the spoon upside down (as all kids do) to try to put it in their mouth. Or, you know, when they flip the bowl upside down...

Unfortunately, he didn't really care for the taste of the oatmeal. So while he concentrated hard to get some on his spoon and then into his mouth, he stopped after 2 or 3 tries because he knew he wouldn't like what was on that spoon.

It really is a shame he's not a happier kid, isn't it?

It's also a shame he can't clean up after himself...