Course we've missed you! we've lost loads of the antenatal folks, but it's understandable, the babies take over! Wow, Connie's really speeding ahead! Amazed she's already chattering and standing up, what's your secret?
James still doesn't talk although he says "ooooh" a lot now, and really tries to talk to his dad when he gets home from work, it's adorable! (He's currently singing quietly and reverently to an organix gingerbread man) he's trying his best to crawl, he can get his chest off the floor, and he can get his bottom end up on his toes, but can't do them both at once yet.
Tasha, have you tried giving your lo half a rusk to hold, or better still a smaller, chip shaped piece of food, like say a stick of steamed/boiled carrot, a finger of toast or some banana? Might be easier for your lo to hold. Personally I think rusk might be a hard one to start with, even though I know they do break down fast once they know what to do with them.
There's no saying you have to do ALL blw or ALL purees anyway, I'm doing both because it suits me. And lo has plenty of jars because they're generally full of good stuff and they're bloody convenient! I do still make my own but I'm not faffing about pureeing chicken etc, I'll let cow n gate worry about that.
My biggest gripe about jarfood is the sheer volume of ground rice they use to pad out the more expensive ingredients. THAT is why babyfood is bland. Babies don't need bland food, it's just cheaper for the companies to produce. J does generally prefer stronger tasting food, maybe he's sick of rice!