hi ditzydel,
i've been doing BLW with my daughter for a whole three weeks, so i am clearly an expert in the field.
like you , i am formula feeding (not by choice, but i must stop being so defensive about it) and i found it profoundly depressing that all of the information was so dismissive of FF. the consensus seems to be that if you FF then you are some kind of Vicki Pollard who will just leave McDonalds fries lying about on the floor and hope that the baby gets the idea. Or perhaps i'm being a little sensitive?
actually, the advice is to ask your health professional. i asked my Health Visitor. she said i would kill my daughter with a choking incident. she is an idiot, of course.
i've just gone for it, although i did do an infant resus class at the local hospital just to be on the safe side. i can't recommend that highly enough, it has made me feel really capable of dealing with any emergencies.
and the baby loves it, really, she's not turned her nose up at anything yet, although her appetite does vary wildly from day to day.
actually, that's where i think the BLW is good. if i had lovingly made a puree and the baby refused it i think it would be disappointed but i couldn't care less if she only eats a little steamed carrot or cucumber (or sticky risotto, green beans, asparagus, beef casserole, broccoli, peach, apricot, banana, sweet potato etc or any of the other things she's had.)
we feed her milk first, then have a muck around, play, bath, nappy change etc and then i sit the bub in her high chair with some chip-sized food in front of her. if it's something nice i have some too.
what we used to do (ooooh, ten days ago, remember, i'm an expert here)was sit her on out knee with both of her hands nice and free and let her guide our hand (holding on to the peach quarter or whatever) into her mouth. now she won't let us do that and wants to do eveything herself. she eats a banana with the skin on, like a little chimp. so basically we've kept the milk and the food separate. if we are out for a meal then we've given her crusts of bread, which she loves.
what else? oh, cucumber is good for taking out as it's not messy. and for the first wee while they appear to let everything drop out of their mouths but wait til you see that first nappy, you'll soon realise that some has got through. not that it matters, it's just for fun rather than nutrition at the moment.
took her a while to get used to water, though, but i think that's because i was using an avent cup which doesn't spill. Or let water come out of the spout. supposed to be 4months and up but i found it tricky at 35. now i use a nuby thing from america or some weird blue teats from boots which fit on avent bottles.
good luck, ditzydel, it's really good fun and minimal stress, and if the baby doesn't fancy it then just leave it for a week and try again. or you and your partner sit eating peaches while making yummmmmmmm noises and see if your DS snatches some out of your hand. that's a big clue... at least it was when DD did it to us.
h x