‘Food is only for fun in the first year’

[Bluebellpainting]

I’ve seen this said a few times in the last couple of weeks to mums asking for advice. Both here and on FB but wondered where this actually comes from as I can’t actually find anything official that says or even implies it. I’m interested to know to better understand why this is said when babies do need food after 6 months as they cannot get enough iron from breast milk or formula alone.

Actually I think formula does have enough iron, particularly the next stage ones.

But mostly it's to stop new parents from worrying that their 8 month old isn't eating 3 square meals a day, from 6-12months and beyond it's very much about a gradual process from milk to solids. A quick look at weaning threads on here shows a lot of angst about babies younger than 12 months only having a few spoonfuls of food here and there.

I think it comes from baby led weaning, so it's all about a baby trying foods, learning textures etc. than worrying about the quantity they eat. Milk (formula or breast) is still the main food and nutrient source for the first year.

I hate this phrase and don't think it's true. It's not just for fun, not only is it to create good eating habits and giving needed nutrients to your baby, it's also developing motor skills, social interaction at meal times, learning to chew and swallow food, eye/hand co ordination. I read a great post on it from just chill mama and she also says she gets so angry when hearing this phrase.

I've never heard it. My baby was over ten pounds at birth and it was pretty essential! I made all his purees and made sure they were nutritious. Going by the statement it's only for 'fun' implies it doesn't matter what you feed them and that's not true.

I think it's quite misleading and might result in some babies missing out on a varied diet. To suggest that a 10 month old doesn't need to be having a balanced diet of all the major food groups is probably quite dangerous, but I'm not an expert.

There seems to be a lot of conflicting opinion out there, which I think is very confusing for first time parents. I found Rana Conway's Weaning Made Easy very helpful, and she is definitely of the opinion that babies should be getting 3 nutritious meals a day from around 7 months.

Maybe a better phrase would be 'food under one SHOULD be fun' rather than 'just' for fun.

I think it's because a babies main source of nutrition is from milk for their first year.

Thank you. Seems that it has just emerged and become one of those things said without any guideline or expert saying so. I just wondered as to me it does seems to imply that you shouldn’t worry about what or how much your baby eats in the first year, but I think food does play an important role from around 6 months, not just for nutrition. Thanks I just wanted to be sure I hadn’t missed something from when I did some reading into it.

Do whatever works for you. BLW will be looked back on as a total fad. Just give a mixture of tastes and textures. Spoon feed some foods and finger food others, eg serve roast dinner or pasta as finger foods but pureed stew. Some vegetables go down better if they are pureed with milder-tasting vegetables. Try out different ways and see what your baby prefers.

It doesn't matter too much what you do now as long as there is a good variety. They mostly become fussy little buggers as soon as they hit two anyway!