1. My Baby Spits Up

Common age: Birth to 6 months

Almost every infant spits up, says Susan B. Roberts, PhD, a professor of nutrition at Tufts University and author of Feeding Your Child for Lifelong Health (Bantam, 1999). It usually happens because a baby's digestive system is still immature. An infant's esophageal sphincter -- the muscle that holds in the stomach contents -- doesn't close tightly like an older child's does. As a result, it's easy for a baby's most recent meal to splash back up, so be prepared to do a few extra loads of laundry from now on. To reduce spit-up episodes, feed your baby only when he shows signs of hunger, keep him in a semi-upright position during feeding, and burp him regularly throughout the meal. It's also a good idea to sit him upright and minimize jostling for half an hour after feeding.

2. Introducing Solids While Breast- or Bottlefeeding Common age: 4 to 12 months It's a dilemma many moms face. But despite the fact that your baby is graduating to solids breast milk or formula is still a very important part of your baby's diet, particularly because milk fat is essential for brain development and the calcium helps build strong teeth and bones. That said, it is safe and healthy to slowly reduce the amount your baby drinks. When you look at how thriving babies split

their intake, there is a wide range of normal; as long as your baby is growing normally while eating and drinking within these parameters, you have nothing to worry about. So which should you give first, milk or solids? There are varying opinions, but experts recommend starting out with breast milk or formula, saving solids for a second course, and washing them down with more milk. The reason? If your baby is very hungry, he may be too distracted to concentrate on maneuvering solids in his mouth and may reject them.

3. My Little One Grazes All Day Common age: 10 months to 2 years Nothing is more exciting to a baby than the discovery that she has mobility, so most crawlers would rather get up and go than sit down and eat. And since young children have little stomachs, eating small bits throughout the day enables them to take in the number of calories they need to keep them revved up. But, Roberts warns, it can be hard to get healthy food into a child who grazes, because meal food tends to be more nutritious than snacks.

So if you have a grazer, put the same amount of thought into her snack foods as you do into each meal, and consider each snack a course of a daylong meal. Vitamin- and mineral-rich fun foods like cereal, banana bits, or cheese sticks are great choices.

Also remember that it's never too early to develop good eating habits. Experts recommend sitting down with the family for at least one meal a day. So do continue to try to get your mover and shaker into the high chair for a few minutes at a time. Around the 2-year mark, entice your little one to spend more time at the table by having snack time just twice a day and offering a wide array of choices at mealtime.