5.5 month old - cant work out weaning schedule to fit around the milk feeds!

[munteria]

Hi

Have started weaning my DS who is 5.5 months. I understand that until 6 months then solids should be given after the milk feed so the baby doesnt cut down on the milk as its more important nutricianly than solids at this stage.

I currently formula feed him at 7am, 11am, 3pm and 7pm with a dream feed at 11pm. I've introduced solids at 11.30am after his 11am FF which seems to work well as around 'lunch-time'.

I am now stuck as want to introduce solids at 'tea-time' but 7pm is too late and 3pm is too early. I've tried to bring the bed-time FF earlier to 6pm but 6.30pm still feels too late for tea-time solids.

Can i give the solids at 5pm or will that put him off his bed-time FF at 7pm?

help - going crazy!!

I always gave food in between milk so a day would go like this:

7am - milk
8am - breakfast
11am - milk
12pm - lunch
3pm - milk
5pm - dinner
7.15pm - milk

thanks Seona. looks great. would that be ok for a baby under 6 months?

the gina ford weaning book says always straight after a milk feed until 6 months when you can split the feeds

yep 5pm could be a good time to try for tea, any later may impact on appetite for bedtime milk (or may not! totally depends on your LO). Just offer small amounts to begin with and watch the 7pm feed carefully to make sure this doesn't get reduced. Then you can gradually up the amount of food at tea time.

Our schedule is like this at 6 1/2 months:

7.30am BF then breakfast straight after
11.15am lunch followed by about 2oz soy-formula (she's phasing this milk feed out herself naturally. Up to a week ago, she was still having a small BF before lunch but we've now switched this to a formula feed after lunch and I express to continue building up bank of EBM in freezer)
3pm BF
5pm tea
6.30pm BF
11pm DF, also phasing out, usually only 5 mins or so BF

Breakfast was the last solid meal that we introduced. Next will be a small afternoon snack after 3pm BF as she's showing signs of needing something extra.

We did something similar, and have recently dropped the mid-morning feed (DS is now 9 months). He has tea at 5 and his last milk feed about 6.45 and he seems to still have a decent amount of milk. At any rate he sleeps till 5-6am and isn't fed again till 7am, and seems fine with that!

HI, I have just started weaning my DS who is 5 and half months old. I have just introduced baby porridge before 10.30am feed with as much bottle as she wants after, also baby porridge and bottle before her bath at 6pm with as much milk as she wants after the bath prior to bed, so basically I have just split this feed. I am in week 2 now and have now started to add some mashed up steamed pear to the porridge. I have just been careful not to give her too much food so milk is still the priority. My plan is to slowly add another food feed and introduce new foods slowly as and when I think she is ready. All seems fine so far, will stick to fruit and veg and add meat in a few weeks.

It's actually milk before solids until 12m not 6m. BM or FM should make up the majority of their diet until then.

6-8m need 130 kcals of complementary foods and 485 kcals from milk (approx 650ml of bm at 75kcals per 100ml) total 615 kcals a day

9-11m need 310 kcals of complementary foods and 376 kcals from milk (approx 500ml of bm at 75kcals per 100ml) total 686 kcals a day.

12-23m need 580 kcals of complementary foods and 314 kcals from milk (approx 420ml of bm at 75kcals per 100ml) total 894 kcals a day.

Full details here on page 18. Pleae note that there is different values for industrialised/developed countries and developing countries. I have listed the industrialised/developed countries figures.

One way to work out when to feed baby is to offer a little of what you have for lunch or dinner (as long as it isn't salty or full of honey and whole nuts!). If you have steak, green beans and boiled new potatoes with gravy, you would just omit gravy from baby' portion and give them a strip of steak to gum (lots of iron in the juices), a few green beans and some chunks of potato. Most adult meals can be given to babies with the exception of raw/rare meat, honey (cooked or raw), very very spiced foods like vindaloos or Texan chili! It's easy to incorporate just a little bit extra into your portion sizes and it can as easily come of Dad's plate as yours.

If you want to do a tea type meal just for baby you could offer pitta strips with something like soft cheese spread on it, wedges of jacket potato (skin off) with steamed broccoli or pasta with a sauce. Those could be made in advance and frozen or prepared in small quantities to be given at 5 (mid way between the milk feeds at 3 & 7).

Hi I'm completely confused about formula amounts.
My DD is 5months old this week and I have been introducing her to food (veg/fruit puréed)for the past few weeks as we have allergies in our family and been told by a top professor it's what to do. Anyhow.
My routine is
6.45am BF
10.30am aptimal pepti (5oz)
New food
2pm ish formula (5oz)
5pm formula (5oz)
Food (small amount)
7.30pm BF
11pm dream feed formula (6oz)
Is she getting too much or too little she's gained heaps and posits quite regularly.
It says in the formula box 7oz! She'll be enormous and uncomfortable.
Any ideas please!!
She's v happy but I'm not sure what's what.
X

As you're mix feeding, those guidelines on the box don't really apply as they are for 100% formula fed babies. I wouldn't try and give her more than you are if she's happy with the amounts you're giving her at the mo.

Is she following a centile line, or is she going up to a higher centile?

I just offered food at our normal mealtimes. The amount and variety of food just increased over time, with the milk feeds reducing.

Ah thanks ladies so I'll add a breakfast in but think I'll just do small amounts for all 3 meals to start with.
Does anyone know how much milk they have once fully having 3 meals?? Is it still the primary food (milk) or does that change once 3 meals consumed?
Thank you SO much!!

You don't need to get to three meals until 8 to 9 months according to the NHS so you've got ages yet. At least until then milk should be primary, then tailing off until 12 months where you can swap to cows milk (assuming no allergy) from a cup, maybe 2 or 3 times a day for about 350ml of milk in total to get the necessary levels of calcium. If you're intending to breastfeed at this age then the cow's milk is a bit less necessary.

If your DD is regularly getting less than 500ml of formula after 6 months then you should also give a vitamin supplement for iron etc. I used the WellKid one.