6mo routine - how do you fit it all in?

[gretagrape]

Hi. Starting on solids this weekend and to be honest I've no idea how I am supposed to fit something else into the day! This is our vague routine at the moment, give or take half an hour:
6.30am - bottle
8am-9am - nap
10am - bottle
11.30-12.30 - nap
1pm - bottle
2.30pm-3.30pm - nap
4pm - bottle
6.30pm - bath, then bottle and bed

I'm not sure how I'm going to fit food in during the period before bottles get dropped because I need to leave it long enough after a bottle so he will be peckish, but then that's going to leave less time for naps (which have only just started to become decent lengths!). Some books say to give half a bottle then solid then finish the bottle but this isn't feasible - my son will scream the place down if the bottle is taken away before it's empty so that's not going to be a relaxing time to give him food. I suppose I could do it when he wakes from a nap but I wonder if he might be too peckish so it might make him annoyed that I'm only offering a bit of puree when what he really wants is a nice big bottle of milk!

What is your routine if you are in the early stages of weaning?

Thanks
x

We just introduced a meal with every bottle (weaned ds at 4 months, dd at almost 6, both were fed on puree so we went against the mn grain), one meal at a time. So to start with, we did breakfast and milk, with milk the rest of the day, for a few days.

We then went on to include supper and milk before bed.

A few days later we gave a meal at lunchtime with a bottle, then a few days later replaced the bottle with a pudding.

A few days later we gave a meal at teatime, with a bottle afterwards, and then replaced the bottle with a pudding.

In all it took about 2 weeks to go from all milk to mostly pureed food. After a few weeks of this we moved on to giving more solid, real food which I would either spoon-feed them or let them feed themselves.

Not the accepted mn method of weaning but it worked for us. They're now just turned 1 and 2.5 and eat most things.

If the baby is awake when you are eating your breakfast/lunch/dinner, give them some. If they eat it, great, if they play with it, great. If they are asleep at mealtimes, relish the peace and eat something salty. Offer milk when they seem hungry or whingy, or try to bite you, and feed as as required in night for quickest return to sleep.

What IdaClair said

Dd2 doesn't nap for longer than 1.5 hours total all day, so I had a bit more time to try solids, and ds1 had feeding difficulties and we weren't able to start weaning until he was 15mo. With dd2, she'll eat if it has been an hour since her bottle - that seems to be enough time for it to go down and for her to have a bit of an appetite. Looking at your times, I would probably choose 11am and 5pm for your times to try solids, provided your lo isn't looking pretty tired at that time - or you could bring it forward by 15 min and try it then. To begin with he'll only be having tastes anyway so he doesn't need to be really hungry - in fact really hungry won't work as he'll just get frustrated and want a bottle. You just don't want him to be completely full. I agree not to try to give him just half a bottle - he'll understandably be cross that you're witholding the rest. It is tricky fitting all the feeds in to begin with. It gets a lot easier as you manage to drop milk feeds. Dd2 is 11mo and still has 3 bottles a day and 3 solid feeds - it became much easier after dropping the fourth bottle, and will be easier again when we drop another - although she is not showing any signs of wanting to give that up just yet! All the best - remember to be as relaxed as possible about weaning and for the two of you to have fun doing it.

Thanks for all your responses.

I am really looking forward to it and am feeling pretty relaxed about the fact that most of it will end up on the floor (maybe the cat will help with some of that) - just wasn't sure how best to fit it in.

I think that 11ish and 5ish sounds like a good idea to start with - he's usually pretty happy at those times, then once he's onto 3 'meals' I'll shift the times around so it fits in with our mealtimes so we are all eating together.

Thanks