7 and a half months old and feeding

[SalsaP]

Hi all.

I've been weaning my ds for a month and a half and he has taken to it very well.

The majority of the mums I know give their babies bottles/breast in between solids as opposed to at the same time ie 7am bottle, 9am breakfast, 11am bottle, etc. I am currently giving my ds a bottle directly before each of his 3 meals a day plus a bottle first thing in the morning and last thing before bed. I think I would struggle to find time to stagger the meals and bottles as my ds has quite long naps inbetween his fairly short wakeful periods. It's hard enough to get out the house as it is!

So, I was wondering what are the advantages to stagger the meals and bottles as that appears to be the norm? Also, would I be holding my ds back in anyway by sticking to my current routine of giving bottle and meals at the same time?

Thank you!

My (just) 10month old is on 3 meals and only really has one, maybe 2 bottles and has done for some time. If you give your sone a bottle just before he eats, he won't eat much as he'll be full of milk. I would give it him afterwards. Put some in his beaker to drink as a 'pudding' almost instead of a meal.
You don't say how much milk he is having or how much food. You need to lower his milk to up his food.

I'd make sure he's having the recommended daily amount of milk as the top priority above solids. I don't know what that is as I breastfeed but I know where is one. I BF my 7 month old on demand so it varies in relation to her meals every day but I aim for feeding her an hour or so before mealtimes or if she wants feeding right before we eat, I just give her a little feed and then she has her proper food. She's self-feeding and the only time she hasn't eaten anything was when she was poorly.

Well i think he drinks loads of milk and eats loads of food so I'm not worried about quantity really. Perhaps you can comment on of this sounds adequate. Today he has had 28oz of milk. For breakfast he had 3 heaped dessertspoons of baby muesli with apple purée mixed in. For lunch he had 3 ice cubes of broccoli and 2 of mash and for dinner he had 1 ice cube of carrot, 1 of courgette and 3 of sweet potato. Sometimes I give him pudding too but didn't today as his dinner was quite late and I didn't want it to stop him from taking his bedtime bottle.

Can I add am I right in thinking that people stagger the meals and milk as a way of ensuring the baby is hungry enough for each or are there other benefits? My baby doesn't ever seem to get full! I swear he'd keep eating if I kept offering!