Outsmarting an Almost-Six-Month-Old

We've been trying to get Thumper to drink a couple ounces of water a day. Not to embarrass the boy, but we thought it might help counteract the effect that the rice cereal has had on his digestive system. To the same end, we've also fed him prunes, pears, and squash. When he had his first bite of squash, he made a face that quite clearly expressed the question: "Why would you put that in my mouth?" But after a few bites, he was enjoying it quite as thoroughly as he had the pears.

Whenever we drink water, we we talk about it. He gets very excited. We give him sips out of our glasses, but that doesn't work very well, though the clink of his tooth on the glass tickles me to no end. So we put the water in a bottle. He was very happy to see the bottle, even if he'd just had formula recently. But when he realized it wasn't formula, he'd get mad, fuss, spit out the water, shove the nipple over to the side of his mouth and chew on it. Then when I pulled it out of his mouth, he'd look at the bottle with great excitement again, and we'd repeat the process. No water was making it down his throat.

Today, though, we tried a sippy cup. I asked him if he wanted water. We went to the kitchen, and he watched me fill the cup that he's never seen before. I told him it was water, then I sipped out of it. "Aaaahhhhh!!" He was intrigued. He simply had to get his hands on that cup.

So I gave it to him. He grabbed the handles with both hands and put it in his mouth. He didn't really understand the mechanics of tipping the cup up, so I helped him. He loved it! Most of it still ran down the front of him, but he definitely drank some. And he couldn't get enough.

I guess the moral of the story is that water sucks when you're expecting formula. I wonder: Will we have to provide a unique container for every variety of beverage we introduce? Will he be drinking apple juice out of a beer stein?