Every mother knows how hard it is to get children to eat at times, especially when they first begin to take solid foods, or when they are convalescent, while there are some children who seem to have a natural and persistent aversion toward whatever is nourishing and particularly good for them. Mothers are sometimes at their wits' end to know what to prepare, and almost sick with discouragement when wholesome, necessary foods are persistently refused.
Sometimes a little ingenuity and an appeal to the child's imagination or eye will induce him to eat a good-sized meal when, at first, he rejected everything.
There are many simple ways of doing this, and the mother will find any number of her own by experimenting.
It is an old custom to cut a slice of bread into slips, naming them for members of the family or friends, but it is a procedure which seems to fascinate most little ones and make the bread more palatable. They get so interested in the various characters, represented by the slips of bread, that it disappears before they realize it.
Slices of bread and butter can be cut into various shapes, such as diamonds, squares, circles, etc., also to represent animals, dogs, cats and horses. The shapes may be crude and mystifying to behold, but children are not critical, and generally accept these representations with approval and credulity.
Often quite a good-sized meal can be coaxed down by putting it into the doll's dishes, filling the tiny cups with milk and putting little squares of bread on the small plates. One child was known to eat a good-sized meal in this way when he absolutely refused the food in other form.
Another way is to provide a pretty china plate with a picture on it, and tell the child to eat the contents so that he will see the picture.
Sometimes an interesting story can be told--with the proviso that the child "eat his dinner" or the mother will not tell the story. He will get interested in the story and forget how much he is eating until it is all gone.
One little boy persistently refused rice, which the physician had ordered for him and his mother had tried in every way to make him eat. One day she conceived the idea of forming the rice into a small mound like an Eskimo hut, smoothing it around to make it an exact reproduction. On the top she placed a small square of butter, which she called the chimney. It happened that the little boy had been much interested in pictures of Eskimo children and their homes, and it appealed to his imagination at once. The mother then buttered a slice of bread and cut it into strips--some large and some small--which she called the family who lived in the hut--father, mother, girls, boys and baby. For this she had the satisfaction of seeing the little fellow eat two good slices of bread and the whole saucer of rice--a thing he had never done before--and with enjoyment.